CAT/C/39/2 page 80 “The crime of torture, when committed against a child or adolescent, constitutes an autonomous offensive entity, whose typical forecast has its legal foundation in article 233 of Law no. 8069/90. This is a normative precept containing an open penal type that may be integrated by the magistrate, since the crime of torture (because it admits many forms of execution) is characterized by the infliction of torment and pain that exasperate, in the physical, moral or psychic dimension of its effects, ,the suffering of the victim though acts of unnecessary, abusive and unacceptable cruelty. By defining the crime of torture against a child or adolescent, the norm contained in article 233 of Law no. 8069/90 is extremely faithful to the constitutional principle of typicity of criminal offenses (Federal Constitution, art. 5, XXXIX). The mere normative reference to torture, contained in the typical description of article 233 of the Statute of the Child and Adolescent shows a conceptual universe impregnated with notions with which people’s common sense and feelings of decency identify degrading conduct that in concrete practice bring the ominous gesture of offense to the dignity of the human person. Torture means the arbitrary negation of human rights, because it reflects (as an illegitimate, immoral and abusive practice) an unacceptable attempt by the State that tends to asphyxiate and even suppress the dignity, autonomy and liberty with which the individual was inalienably endowed by the positive order. By typifying the crime of torture against children and adolescents, Brazil demonstrated its faithfulness to the commitments assumed in the international order, especially those stemming from the New York Convention on the Rights of Children (1990), the Convention against Torture adopted by the U.N. General Assembly (1984), the InterAmerican Convention Against Torture, concluded in Cartagena (1985) and the American Convention on Human Rights (Pact of San José, Costa Rica, formulated within the scope of the OAS (1969). Furthermore, by conferring typical expression to that modality of criminal offense, the Brazilian legislator effectively applied the text of the Federal Constitution, which imposes on the Public Power the obligation to protect minors against all forms of violence, cruelty and oppression (art. 227, caput, in fine). A police officer who, under the pretext of exercising criminal repression in the name of the State, inflicts, through abusive professional performance, physical harm on a minor eventually placed under his power of coercion, availing himself of this executive means to intimidate and coerce his victim to make him confess a given offense, practices unequivocally the crime of torture, such as it is typified in article 233 of the Statute of the Child and Adolescent, exposing himself, by virtue of this arbitrary behavior, to all the legal consequences deriving from Law no. 8072/90 (art. 2o.), whose foundation is article 5, XLIII of the Federal Constitution. The crime of torture against a child or adolescent, whose practice subsumes the crime of light bodily harm, is placed under the jurisdiction of the ordinary justice of the member State, since this penal offense, which has no typical correspondent in any of the conducts included in the Military penal Code, lies beyond the field of competence of the state military justice. (Supreme Federal Court Plenary - Habeas corpus no. 70.389-5- São Paulo - 23 July 1994 v.u. rel. Decision (Acórdão) Mins. Celso de Mello, in B.AASP, 1881/13, - j. 11 Jan. 1995).” “(j) All victims of torture should be provided with compensation. The State party should ensure that enough funds are allocated to make the relevant payments. The existing system of implementation of judicial decisions that grant State compensation to victims of torture so that these persons may receive the compensation that they are entitled to should be reformed in a timely fashion;”