Certidão de Antecedentes Criminais for US Green Card: What Brazilians Need

The US Consulate in Rio de Janeiro will reject your immigrant visa application for one missing or expired police certificate. For Brazilian nationals, the requirements are specific and the 90-day validity window is unforgiving. This is what you need, where to get it, and how to time it correctly.

Two Types of Police Certificates Required

Brazilian applicants for EB-2 and EB-3 green cards must provide two distinct police certificates — not one, not a combined document:

1. Federal Police Certificate (Certidão de Antecedentes Criminais — Polícia Federal)

This covers the national criminal database maintained by the Polícia Federal. You access it at the Polícia Federal website (https://www.pf.gov.br), under Serviços > Certidão de Antecedentes Criminais. You will need a valid CPF and access to the gov.br authentication system.

The certificate is generated digitally as a signed PDF. On its own, this digital document is valid for many domestic Brazilian purposes — but for US immigration, you must apostille it before submitting to NVC or bringing it to your consular interview.

2. State Police Certificates (Certidão de Antecedentes — Secretaria de Segurança Pública)

You must obtain a state-level certificate from the Secretaria de Segurança Pública (SSP) of every Brazilian state where you lived for 6 months or more in the last 5 years. If you lived in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro in the last 5 years, you need certificates from both the SSP-SP and the SSP-RJ.

One common mistake: Brazilian courts (Fórum) issue Certidões de Distribuição or Certidões de Antecedentes Judiciais — these are judicial records, not police certificates. The US Consulate specifically requires the Public Security (Segurança Pública) certificate from the SSP, not the judicial record from the Tribunal de Justiça. Judicial records are not an acceptable substitute.

The 90-Day Validity Rule

Both the federal and state certificates have a validity of 90 days from the date of issuance for US immigration purposes. This is one of the most common sources of delays at NVC and at the consular interview.

The timeline problem: NVC may take 4 to 8 weeks to review your documents after you submit them. If NVC issues a checklist for a different document — an expired-format birth certificate, a missing apostille on your marriage certificate — and you need to resubmit, another 4 to 8 weeks pass. If that process crosses the 90-day mark on your police certificate, you will need to obtain new certificates and re-apostille them.

Practical timing strategy: Do not obtain your police certificates until you have received NVC's fee invoice and are ready to submit your full civil document package. If NVC's review takes 8 weeks and you build in a buffer, you want certificates that were issued no earlier than 4 to 6 weeks before your submission date.

Apostille Requirements

Because Brazil joined the Hague Apostille Convention in 2016, Brazilian public documents can be apostilled domestically rather than legalized at the US Embassy. The apostille for Brazilian documents is managed through the Conselho Nacional de Justiça (CNJ).

For the federal police certificate: After downloading the signed PDF from the Polícia Federal website, you take it to an apostille-authorized Cartório. The Cartório authenticates the digital signature and issues the apostille through the CNJ's e-Apostila system. Not all Cartórios are authorized for e-Apostila — the CNJ maintains a list at cnj.jus.br.

For state police certificates: The process is similar — obtain the physical or digital certificate from the SSP, then take it to an authorized Cartório for apostille. Some states have integrated their SSP digital systems with CNJ's e-Apostila directly; others still require you to go to a Cartório.

Each apostilled document then needs a sworn translation (tradução juramentada) into English by a Tradutor Juramentado registered with the state Junta Comercial.

What the US Consulate Reviews

At your immigrant visa interview at the US Consulate in Rio de Janeiro, the consular officer will check that:

• Both certificates are present (federal and state-level for each relevant state)
• Each certificate has a valid apostille
• Each has a certified sworn translation
• Neither is older than 90 days from issuance

If you have lived in any other country for 12 months or more since turning 16, you will also need a police certificate from that country. For Brazilians who spent extended time in the US on H-1B or L-1 visas, the FBI Identity History Summary is the equivalent US document.

If You Have a Record

A criminal record does not automatically disqualify you from an EB-2 or EB-3 visa. USCIS and the consulate evaluate the nature and severity of the offense. Minor infractions, traffic violations in Brazil, and expunged records are handled differently than serious crimes. However, you must disclose everything — failing to disclose a record when asked is itself grounds for permanent inadmissibility under INA Section 212(a)(6)(C). Get legal advice before your interview if there is anything on your record.

Managing the 90-day window, apostille chain, and dual-certificate requirement is one of the most time-sensitive parts of the Brazilian green card process. The Brazil to US EB-2/EB-3 Green Card Guide includes a complete document procurement checklist with timing guidance for each Brazilian document, so you can sequence everything correctly and avoid restarting the apostille process from scratch.

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