Justiça Penal Negocial e o Acordo de Não Persecução Penal no Brasil: Expansão, Desafios e Limites Constitucionais

This study critically examines the Non-Prosecution Agreement (Acordo de Não Persecução Penal – ANPP), introduced into Brazilian criminal procedure by Law No. 13.964/2019, as a key expression of contemporary negotiated criminal justice. The research explores the normative and jurisprudential development of the ANPP within the broader trajectory of expanding consensual mechanisms in Brazil’s criminal justice system — beginning with the creation of the Special Criminal Courts and evolving through the use of plea deals such as leniency agreements and plea bargaining in the form of plea collaborations. The study assumes that the ANPP shifts the locus of the penal response to the pre-trial phase, granting the Public Prosecutor’s Office significant discretion that demands robust institutional oversight. The article discusses the theoretical foundations, limitations, and structural risks of consensual justice, drawing from critical legal scholarship on power asymmetry, the erosion of procedural guarantees, and the systemic selectivity of penal control. Based on recent decisions by the Brazilian Supreme Court and Superior Court of Justice, the paper highlights interpretative controversies and practical challenges in the implementation of the ANPP. It concludes that, while the agreement offers a pragmatic tool for rationalizing criminal proceedings, its legitimacy depends on strict oversight, real parity between the parties, and an institutional commitment to upholding the fundamental rights of the accused — lest it become a covert tool of punitive arbitrariness.