The First Panel of Brazil's Supreme Federal Court (STF) ruled unanimously to keep Jordana Alves Jardim, 25, in the Tocantins Military Police (PMTO) entrance contest. The candidate, who stands 1.55 m tall, had been cut at the documents and medical exams stage even after passing the physical fitness test, known in Brazil as the TAF. The judgment took place in a virtual session that ended on Friday (21), with the justices rejecting an appeal by the state Attorney General's Office, which sought to uphold her disqualification on height grounds, according to g1.

Jardim was disqualified for falling five centimeters short of the 1.60 m required by the contest rules and by Tocantins State Law No. 2,578/2012. In April, her lawyers took the case straight to the Supreme Court through a constitutional complaint, a mechanism used when one of the court's binding precedents is disobeyed. The rapporteur, Justice Cristiano Zanin, granted an injunction suspending her elimination, and the case went to trial before the First Panel.

Reviewing the state's appeal, Zanin said the elimination breached STF precedents, particularly Theme 1,424 of the court's general repercussion system and the ruling in ADI 5,044/DF. Under the court's settled case law, minimum height requirements for security force contests must follow the parameters of the Brazilian Army, set by Federal Law No. 12,705/2012: 1.60 m for men and 1.55 m for women. Because Jardim measures exactly 1.55 m and had already passed the fitness test, the panel held that her disqualification could not stand.

Justices Flávio Dino, the panel's president, Alexandre de Moraes and Cármen Lúcia voted with the rapporteur. According to Jornal Opção, Cármen Lúcia added a reservation about awarding attorney fees in constitutional complaints, though she joined her colleagues. The panel applied article 85, paragraph 11, of the Code of Civil Procedure and raised by 10% the legal fees the state must pay her lawyers.

The state's arguments

In its appeal, the Tocantins government argued that the constitutional complaint was not the proper instrument to challenge the state law, and that setting aside the height requirement would amount to a constitutional review without the full bench safeguard required by article 97 of the Constitution. The state Attorney General's Office also argued that loosening the requirement could harm the principles of legality, of the binding force of the contest rules and of equal treatment among candidates.

In a statement, the Tocantins Military Police said it will fully comply with the ruling and take the administrative steps needed to keep Jardim in the contest, noting that the decision has an individual effect and that the corporation will follow the law to preserve fairness and the regularity of the selection process. Her defense called the outcome a unanimous victory and said the decision "has relevance that goes beyond the concrete case", because the court reaffirmed that attorney fees can be awarded in constitutional complaints.