“A Suicides Wave in the LGBT Wing”

Gender, Sexuality, and the Governance of Life and Death in the Prison System

Abstract

This article examines the sequence of deaths that occurred in the LGBT wing of Minas Gerais’ prison system in 2021, framed as a “wave of suicides.” By tracing the trajectory of the prison policy of sociospatial segregation and territorial expansion—and its lethal outcomes—I seek to unpack the factors and institutional dynamics that shape the state’s distinct, and at times conflicting, interventions in this case. To do so, the study analyzes the legal proceedings and disputes generated by these deaths. Methodologically, it draws on multi-sited ethnography combining participant observation and document analysis, focusing in particular on a damages lawsuit brought by the Public Defender’s Office of Minas Gerais against the prison system. The article argues that, although the documents open a dispute over causality and custodial duties, the deaths tend to be reabsorbed by an institutional grammar that individualizes them as “self-extermination” and dilutes the attribution of responsibility. It further shows that gender and sexuality operate ambivalently: on paper, they enable statements of state negligence and reparation, while also sustaining an institutional architecture that deepens violations and drives the sociospatial expansion of prison policy.