Portuguese 
The employer’s name has been returned to Brazil’s Slave Labor Register after the president of the Superior Labor Court (TST) suspended, at the request of the Attorney General’s Office, the ruling that had nullified the entire administrative process regarding the rescue of a domestic worker in Florianópolis in July. The decision was signed on Thursday, September 3, by Minister Luiz Philippe Vieira de Mello Filho, and was made public by the court on Friday.
This temporarily overturns the ruling from the 4th Chamber of the Regional Labor Court of the 12th Region in Santa Catarina, which had removed the employer’s name from the Employers Register. This measure will remain until there is a final judgment.
In other words, as long as there is an appeal, the name will stay on the list.
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The Attorney General’s Office was the one that prompted the court. The agency argued that the removal of the name from the registry produced immediate effects, while the discussion about the validity of the process would still take months to conclude.
Forty Years in a Home, Without Pay, Vacation, or Annual Bonus
The case is that of Sônia Maria de Jesus, a Black woman with profound bilateral deafness, who was rescued in 2023 from the residence of a family in Florianópolis. According to Repórter Brasil, this residence belongs to Justice Jorge Luiz de Borba of the Santa Catarina Court of Justice.
The employer named in the case is Ana Cristina Gayotto de Borba, the magistrate’s wife.
According to the TST’s ruling, she was subjected to conditions similar to slavery for nearly four decades. The violation reports detail 40 years without pay, without vacation, without an annual bonus, and without a weekly rest day.
The Room Was an External Area, Damp and Infested
The description in the reports is straightforward. She lived in an external, damp room with leaks, continuously performing cleaning tasks, personal care, and clothing maintenance for the family.
This was not an informal weekend arrangement.
It was a daily routine for decades, with no documented compensation. Cleaning the home, caring for individuals, and managing clothing were all part of the same workday, with no recorded start or end times.
The inspection designated this situation as analogous to slavery, which is defined in Brazilian legislation when there is excessive working hours, degrading conditions, or restrictions on freedom.
The Family’s Justification Was That She Was “Part of the Family”
The defense argued that the worker had been welcomed and treated as a family member. Therefore, according to this version, there would be no employment relationship to formalize.
The Special Mobile Inspection Group disagreed. This group includes the Labor Inspection, the Labor Public Ministry, the Federal Public Ministry, the Federal Defender’s Office, and the Federal Police.
According to the agencies investigating the case, her vulnerable situation was exploited for decades, and the claim of familial belonging did not correspond to reality.
The Argument That Dismantled the Defense: She Never Learned to Communicate
The detail that the inspection used to dismantle this version is hard to read.
According to the agencies involved in the investigation, she had no access to education, was not literate in Portuguese, and had not learned Brazilian Sign Language. A family member had learned to communicate; an invisible worker, however, had not.
The worker was also isolated from social interactions and her biological family, according to the reports. This isolation, according to the investigation, upheld the defense’s claim of familial belonging.
She was rescued in 2023, after the inspection entered the residence.
Why the TRT-12 Annulled Everything in July
The regional court did not discuss the merits of the rescue. It annulled the administrative process on procedural grounds.
For the 4th Chamber, the decision that upheld the fine should have been communicated to the appointed lawyer, not directly to the employer. As a result, the name was removed from the registry in July.
This type of nullity often decides administrative processes in Brazil: it is not about what happened at home, but rather to whom the notice was addressed.
The president of the Superior Labor Court Responded that the Inspection Has Its Own Rules
Vieira de Mello Filho understood that the labor inspection procedure follows a specific norm established in a decree from the Ministry of Labor and Employment, which requires personal notification of the fined party.
Furthermore, the minister noted that the technical defense was presented, processed, and analyzed by the administrative authority. Since there was no concrete harm to the right of defense, the flaw pointed out by the regional court would not be sufficient, at this moment, to annul the entire process.
“Setback in the State Protection of Human Dignity,” Wrote the Minister
The most direct part of the decision addresses the practical effect of removing a name from the registry while the case is still under discussion.
“The removal of the fined party’s name from the Employers’ Registry represents a setback in the state protection of human dignity and weakens the social safety net,” wrote Vieira de Mello Filho.
In his assessment, the removal from the list causes serious damage to social, administrative, and legal orders. It also undermines the oversight of domestic slave labor, which already faces challenges in entering homes and producing evidence.
The Dirty List Has Existed Since 2003 and Is Updated Twice a Year
The Employers’ Registry has been maintained by the federal government since 2003 and is updated biannually. According to Repórter Brasil, the United Nations considers it one of the most effective tools in combating slave labor worldwide.
The minister emphasized that the registry functions as a transparency tool, ensuring that society has access to information about serious human rights violations.
We tend to imagine slave labor in charcoal production, agriculture, or construction sites. In this case, however, it occurred in a high-class home in a capital city, behind a closed door.
This is precisely the difficulty the minister pointed out. Labor inspectors do not enter private residences with the same ease as they do construction sites or farms.
What the Decision Still Does Not Resolve
The injunction does not judge the merits. The minister himself highlighted that the decision does not anticipate the definitive judgment of the controversy but merely maintains the effects of the fine while the case continues.
The process is under judicial secrecy to protect medical and family information of the worker, which is why much is not public.
No compensation amount has appeared in publications thus far. There is also no defined timeline for the final judgment of the controversy.
In the meantime, the registry retains the name, which will still be there for the next biannual update.
This type of dispute between the form of the process and the content of the fine frequently arises in Labor Justice, as seen in a case where the employment link was dropped due to a statement made by the author herself.
The full text of the ruling and the official summary can be found in the notice published by the Superior Labor Court, with detailed coverage of the case reported by Leonardo Sakamoto in Repórter Brasil.
What do you think: removing a name from the list due to a formal error protects the right to defense or fosters impunity?
