Tribunal do júri e liberdade de informação jornalística: a (im) pertinência da divulgação de casos afetos ao tribunal do júri

Abstract

This work takes the procedural system of the jury and the press freedom to begin an analysis of the balance of values that may be required in some cases involving both. The protection given by the Constitution to the press freedom, and some fundamental rights, such as image, honor, intimacy, privacy and the due process of law, at the same level, only allows that, in the conflict among them, one can prevail to protect the most value interest in that specific case, not removing the prevailed from the system. Thus, in cases of crimes against life, the due process lies on the trial by ordinary people, laymen judges, but by no means exempt from being impartial and free to decide about the merits, the possible influence by the disclosure of circumstances concerning the fact and, further, the accused as "evil", may advise that press freedom should be restricted, not by the law, but by self- responsibility of people working for the media. As the work shows, press freedom was qualified by the Federal Constitution as full and unrestricted, but this cannot disguise abuse and perverted purposes, so we must recognize that, beside the fullness granted to press freedom, ethics, responsibility and social aim are elementary in communication activity. And yet, human dignity cannot be denied by the press freedom. Several jury cases are disseminated by mass media, especially murder cases, but the publicity referred in the Constitution is not realized on this disclosure, but by giving the chance of controlling Judiciary acts. In most cases, therefore, the disclosure is not reasonable, so that, personality rights and principles of criminal process may be irreparably violated. Therefore, throughout the work, issues were brought to try to show that the solution is not easy, even not mathematics, but necessary to ensure primary precepts of the Constitution. To illustrate, cases that became notorious for dissemination in the media were mentioned, beyond the one that became a landmark in the subject because it was the first that, after the disclosure in pretrial, was authorized the broadcast of the trial session, supposedly because people could learn from that experience