Background
João Ramalho Dantas Neto sat for the Federal Highway Police entrance examination governed by Edital No. 1/2021. He was eliminated after being rated “unfit” in the psychological evaluation phase. He sued the federal government and Cebraspe — the examination body — seeking annulment of that result on the ground that the psychological assessment relied on subjective, non-disclosed criteria in violation of the constitutional guarantees of due process and the right to a reasoned decision. He also asked for an order allowing him to sit the remaining examination stages and, ultimately, to be appointed if he placed sufficiently high.
At first instance his claims were dismissed on the merits, with attorney’s fees set at 10% of the amount in controversy as stated in the complaint (R$ 70,388.40, calculated by reference to the prospective annual salary for the position). On appeal, the Federal Regional Court for the First Region reversed on the merits, declared the psychological elimination void, and directed that the plaintiff be permitted to continue in the examination. The appellate court also granted Cebraspe’s cross-appeal solely to reduce the amount in controversy, resetting it to R$ 1,000.00 — reasoning that the suit challenged only procedural regularity without any immediately quantifiable economic benefit, and therefore did not fall within Article 292, § 2 of the Code of Civil Procedure (CPC), which ties the amount in controversy to the annual value of the position at stake.
The plaintiff then filed a Special Appeal (recurso especial) with the STJ, arguing that Article 292, § 2 of the CPC mandates use of the annual-salary criterion and that the amount in controversy should therefore remain at R$ 70,388.40, with attorney’s fees calculated on that basis. The Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office supported referring the question to the binding-precedent track. The First Region’s Federal Regional Court had already identified 201 cases raising the same controversy.
The Court’s Holding
The First Section of the STJ unanimously designated REsp 2253006 as the lead case (recurso representativo da controvérsia) for resolution under the binding-precedent procedure for repetitive appeals (recursos repetitivos) established by Articles 1,036–1,041 of the CPC and Article 257-C of the STJ’s Internal Rules. The legal question formally delimited is: “Whether, in actions that challenge only the regularity of a stage of a public competitive examination, without any immediate economic benefit, the criterion of Article 292, § 2 of the CPC applies for fixing the amount in controversy.”
Pending resolution of that question on the merits in a future ruling, the Court ordered the immediate suspension of all special appeals and interlocutory appeals from special appeals — whether pending before the second-instance courts or already before the STJ — that involve the same issue. The Court further directed that notice of the designation decision be sent to all STJ Justices and to the Presidents of the Federal Regional Courts and the State Courts of Justice, and that the Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office be given fifteen days to file a brief.
The Court did not yet resolve the underlying substantive question; this decision is purely procedural, certifying the controversy for uniform binding treatment and freezing related cases in the meantime.
Key Takeaways
- The STJ has formally opened a binding-precedent proceeding to settle whether Article 292, § 2 of the CPC — which values the amount in controversy by reference to the annual salary of the contested position — applies to suits that challenge only the procedural regularity of a public-exam stage without an immediate monetary claim.
- All special appeals nationwide touching this question are now suspended pending the STJ’s merits ruling; lower courts and the STJ itself cannot advance these cases until the binding thesis is issued.
- The practical stakes are significant: the choice of valuation method can shift attorney’s fees substantially — from a nominal R$ 1,000.00 base (as the appellate court used below) to tens of thousands of reais calculated on projected annual salary.
- The lead case arose from a challenge to a psychological evaluation in a federal prison-service examination, but the binding question will govern all civil-service-exam irregularity actions regardless of the career involved.
Why It Matters
The amount-in-controversy question has produced a high volume of conflicting decisions — the First Region alone counted 201 cases — because it sits at the intersection of procedural civil law and public employment law. If the STJ ultimately holds that Article 292, § 2 applies, candidates who prevail in examination-irregularity suits will be entitled to attorney’s fees calculated on a much larger base, increasing both litigation incentives and the financial exposure of federal agencies and examination bodies like Cebraspe. If the Court rules the other way and endorses the nominal R$ 1,000.00 valuation, the practical recovery in successful suits will be minimal, potentially dampening access to judicial review of examination decisions.
For practitioners, the suspension order has immediate consequences: any pending special appeal on this issue is frozen until the binding thesis is published. Attorneys should monitor the STJ docket for the merits hearing date and the eventual ruling, which will bind all Brazilian courts under the mandatory-precedent system established by the 2015 CPC.