A prescrição penal como fator criminógeno: possibilidade e necessidade de reformas no sistema jurídico-criminal brasileiro

Abstract

This work exposes the Brazilian statute of limitation, cause of extinction of punishability, under article 107, IV (1st part) of the Criminal Code, focused here as factor that stimulates the practice of crimes, because it helps to engender impunity and it is considerated as one of the springs that propels the crime. In the first chapter, it is demonstrated that Brazil is a country with high rates of criminality and that the human rights of victims are being neglected by the non-implementation, in fact, of the principle of security, besides the fact that the leniency on statute of limitation s rules violates the social pact. The description, species and subspecies of statute of limitation and summarized notions about the legal nature of the institute, are presented in the second chapter, while third chapter examines the basis of the statute of limitation, pointing up its fragility, for after that, in the fourth chapter, presents the secondary thesis: the need to repeal the rule of Article 115 of the Criminal Code, the reduction by half of limitations periods, in view of the age of the offender. It is exposed, in the fifth fraction, the main thesis: possibility of incorporation in our legal system of new cases of imprescriptibility, situation formally admissible and historically syntonized with the modern trend  searched in the internal law of other countries and in international criminal law  of imprescriptibility or enlargement of limitations periods. In chapter six, data collected in an extensive and unpublished field research about the statute of limitation in Brazil are presented, from where are made the conclusions exposed in the last chapter, that is possible to create new cases of imprescriptibility in our law, being essential to take the necessary steps to reduce the impunity among ourselves