For every femicide, Brazil records 500 threats, 182 assaults and 79 crimes of persecution against women

The proportion helps to measure the escalation of violence that may precede murder for gender reasons, experts highlight. Every day, the country records, on average, four femicides and more than 2,000 threats against women.

Last year, 1,571 were victims of femicide, the highest number in the historical series, according to the 20th Brazilian Public Security Yearbook. The national rate was 1.4 victims of femicide for each group of 100 thousand women.

In crimes that appear on the previous steps of this escalation, the rates were much higher: 720.9 records of threats, 261.7 of intentional bodily harm in the context of domestic violence, 113.3 of stalking and 55.6 of psychological violence for every 100 thousand women.

For Juliana Brandão, Gender and Race coordinator at the Brazilian Public Security Forum, these records should be understood as progressive signs of a risk that could culminate in lethal violence.

"Generally, the aggressor tries to control the woman's autonomy and reacts with more violence the more he loses this control", he states.

Identifying the crimes that precede death, she says, can open up opportunities to interrupt this cycle.

Stalking increased by 30.1% in 2025. Throughout the year, 123,871 cases were recorded in Brazil, equivalent to an average of 339 incidents per day. Records of psychological violence grew by 16.9% and totaled 60,830 cases.

The starting point, says the coordinator, is usually psychological violence. "I'm talking about insults, manifestations of jealousy, routine surveillance, isolation from the woman's support network and even the constant disqualification of that woman", he explains.

Following this, according to the expert, threats of death or aggression against children and family members, destruction of objects and physical attacks, such as pushing and slapping, may arise. These behaviors would work as ways to gradually expand the aggressor’s dominance.

Another warning sign appears in the records of non-compliance with urgent protective measures, which increased by 16.7% in the period. For every femicide recorded in the year, 84 violations of these measures were recorded.

This data draws attention because failure to comply with a court order occurs in a situation of violence that has already been identified by the authorities and in which some form of protection had already been determined.

The Yearbook also points out that, among the states that reported the data, one in every nine women murdered in feminicides already had an urgent protective measure active at the time of death.

Escalation also appears in attempted femicides. In 2025, 4,189 women survived this type of crime, an increase of 5.9% compared to the previous year.

The definition of attempt provided for in the Penal Code considers that the crime is not consummated due to circumstances beyond the control of the perpetrator.

In São Paulo, feminicide records grew 8.1% in 2025, reaching the highest number in the historical series for this type of crime that began in 2018.

There were 266 cases of women murdered due to gender, compared to 246 in, according to data from the SSP (Public Security Secretariat).

Among the cases of violence that drew attention last year was that of Tainara Souza Santos, 31, who was run over and dragged for around a kilometer on November 29.

She died on December 24, at Hospital das Clínicas, after almost a month in hospital. Douglas Alves da Silva was arrested on suspicion of being the perpetrator of the crime. The defendant remains imprisoned in the interior of São Paulo.

FALLING HOMICIDES OF WOMEN

Femicides now correspond to 44.4% -1,571 of a total of 3,539- of the murders of women in the country, also the highest proportion in the historical series.

The evolution of cases occurs in a scenario in which lethal violence against women presents different movements. While femicides increased, homicides of women fell by 5.5% between 2024 and 2025.

In 2025, 1,968 homicides of women were recorded that were not classified as feminicide.

According to Brandão, the increase in feminicide records may reflect, in part, an improvement in the ability to identify and frame this violence. But the continued growth over the years indicates that the phenomenon cannot be explained solely by improved notification.

"If we were just dealing with an improvement in registration, we would expect stabilization after a few years, but unfortunately what we have observed is continuous growth over time", he states.

According to the Yearbook, the two movements are not contradictory: what the data show is a selective decline in lethal violence against women, with a reduction in deaths not registered as motivated by gender reasons.

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This difference helps to demonstrate that deaths classified as feminicide follow their own dynamics, generally related to gender-based violence and the links between victim and aggressor, according to experts.

In 79.8% of femicides recorded in 2025, the perpetrator was the victim's partner or ex-partner. The domestic environment also appears as one of the main scenarios for this type of crime: 62.5% of cases occurred inside the home.