Man with nazi tattoos is released after statement at RJ police station

Ívina Garcia – Cenarium Magazine

MANAUS – Denounced for having tattoos that make apology for Nazism and racism, a man, still unidentified, was taken to a police station in Rio de Janeiro on Saturday, 28, where he was heard and released. The Civil Police (PC) inspector who attended the case said it was an “atypical fact”.

According to the images sent to the report, the man has a swastika and a black sun (neo-Nazi symbol) tattooed on his left arm. The witness also states that there was another tattoo written “white pride”.

The witness, identified as Leonardo Guimarães, says that he was walking in Largo do Machado, a square located on the border of the neighborhoods of Catete, Flamengo, and Laranjeiras, in the city of Rio de Janeiro, when he saw the man with the tattoos.

He reports that he took some pictures and immediately contacted police officers in the surroundings, who said they did not know whether the tattoos were a crime or not. Leonardo says that after explaining and insisting a lot, the police officers approached him and took him to the police station.

“When I got there, it was difficult to deal with the inspector on duty. He said that if the accused wanted to tattoo a genital organ there would be no problem, I tried to argue showing the law, but he said that tattooing was not propaganda, that he could do whatever he wanted with his body”, reports Leonardo.

According to Law 9.459, of May 13, 1997, making apology to nazism is a crime, with a penalty of two to five years and a fine. According to the law, it is illegal to “manufacture, sell, distribute, or broadcast symbols, emblems, ornaments, badges, or propaganda that use the swastika or swastika for the purpose of disseminating nazism”.

Even with the inspector’s resistance, the boy insisted again, talking about the law and remembering that there is a Federal Supreme Court (STF) decision on the case. However, according to the witness, the inspector said that “the STF does not rule the police station” and apologized to the man with Nazi tattoos.

“He said it was an atypical fact and there was no crime in the tattoos. He also said that he knew my ‘type’ and called me a ‘leftist, who defends gayism’,” says the witness.

Also according to the report, the police report was published without Leonardo’s statement, because the inspector did not wait for the arrival of the lawyer who would accompany the witness, as claimed by Leonardo.

The record provides a series of justifications for the tattoos using meanings from before the Nazi period. The inspector wrote that “according to a Google search, the swastika symbol is an ancient object that means good luck or well-being. As for the black sun, the justification is that “the symbol is an ancient Germanic emblem, which refers to the day the world would end”.

In a statement, the Civil Police of Rio said that the case was registered to “investigate the practice of racism or apology to crime. The institution denies that “any opinion or offense” was made by the agents of the police station. “In the unit, the person who reported the fact refused to make statements at that time. The man with the tattoo on his body, on the other hand, claimed that ‘the swastika is an ancient symbol and exists before Nazism’.”

“This is a murderous ideology, which has killed millions, and is typified in our law as a crime. It is impressive how some policemen put their own ideology above the work that should be done by them”, says Leonardo.

Consulted by the report, lawyer Flávio Espírito Santo explains that there is a difference between the Nazi and Buddhist symbol of the swastika. “What differentiates one from the other is the position: the Buddhist swastika has a more “straight” aspect, as if it were inside an isosceles square; while the Gamada cross, the Nazi swastika, has a more rhomboidal aspect”, he says.

Adaptation

As an example, the lawyer recalls that in a recent adaptation for “Blade of The Immortal”, a Japanese comic book, the protagonist uses the Buddhist swastika in his costume, altered so that it wouldn’t offend Western people.

“If even orientals, who used the symbol before the cultural appropriation carried out by the Nazis, are careful when representing it to Westerners, a Western, white man hardly lacks the necessary information to know the impact that the symbol he tattooed carries,” he claims.

Flavio claims that there is an “over-consciousness”, that is, many factors that link the situation to Nazi apology. “I believe there is a possibility, even if very small, that the two tattoos with symbols of potential Nazi meaning being so close to each other on the subject’s arm is an unfortunate coincidence. But there were more than enough elements for the opening of an inquiry, where this would be investigated.”

Manaus

In April 2022, a man identified as André Lucas Freitas de Souza, 31, was photographed at a soccer match in Manaus with a tattoo of an eagle standing on top of a laurel wreath, associated with the Nazi regime. In a statement, the man, 31, claimed he did not know the meaning.

“He claimed that when he got the tattoo ten years ago, he wanted to get an eagle, looked in the catalog and chose to have that design tattooed on him,” reported the delegate Ivo Martins, head of the 5th DIP. André would have started the work of covering the tattoo after the repercussion of the case.

For the lawyer heard by the report, the swastika is a much better known symbol, therefore, it would not fit to allege ignorance about the Nazi meaning. “The anti-racism law criminalizes the dissemination of Nazi symbols, but it also has its ‘loopholes’. It is only a crime to use the swastika as a swastika if it is ‘for the purpose of disseminating nazism'”, he says.

Flávio explains that this silent manifestation through tattoos might not fit the law, depending on the judge’s interpretation of the case. “Although I particularly believe that the symbol is self-evident as dissemination of nazism,” he concludes.