Books & Arts
Want to send this page or a link to a friend? Click on mail at the top of this window.
                     
Posted December 1, 2005
                           
Return to related article
nytlogo.gif (3067 bytes) ny times international.gif (1036 bytes)
           
São Paulo Journal

Felons All, but Free to Try Being Beauty Queen for a Day

                                
felons 4.jpg (53852 bytes)

Photographs by Lalo de Almeida for The New York Times

                                                              
felons 5.jpg (64744 bytes)
Local beauty schools and charities provided makeup and wax and hair treatments. The Miss Penitenciária pageant is quickly becoming one of the best-known pageants in beauty-obsessed Brazil.
                                                      
felons 6.jpg (42005 bytes)
Though each contestant received a package with shampoos, lotions and makeup, better self-esteem, they said, was the biggest part of the payoff.
                           
felons 7.jpg (93042 bytes)
Four inmates from this prison participated in the annual contest in São Paulo.
                                   
felons 8.jpg (44022 bytes)
Rather than shackles and prison yellow, the convicts donned evening gowns and high heels, bathing suits and costume jewelry.
                                                        
felons 9.jpg (59574 bytes)
Charged to ignore the women's crimes, the jury instead was instructed to judge them on their beauty and congeniality, and on their talents in writing essays and poetry.
                                                
felons 10.jpg (92609 bytes)
The finale took place in the courtyard of a prison for women.
                       
Wehaitians.com, the scholarly journal of democracy and human rights
More from wehaitians.com
Main / Columns / Books And Arts / Miscellaneous