The current work aims at performing an analysis of the criminals "pathologization" movement by means of a historical reading of the impact of ''brain scientificism" in the criminal sphere. more particularly, there is an emphasis on the reception of the lombrosionism matrix theories in 1 9th-century brazilian criminology, in which we can see the microcosms of classes and races conflicts of interests, mediated by the medical authority who, in his scientific beliefs ¡or in his ideological filiations), looked for illuminate the limits between the moral fault and the madness - or the both (moral madness) as pathology or as pure perversity -and tried to show the correct form ¡scientific} of punishing or treating.
Criminal anthropology; Mental illness; pathologization; Nina Rodrigues