First degree judges of Justice in Pernambuco reflect on how they decide the merits of their sentences, based on their free conviction and the set of legal framework and established jurisprudence. However, despite the independence and autonomy that the judge enjoys to decide freely, the documentary reveals that, in Brazil, there is a complex mechanism of hierarchy of judicial decisions whose merit is not only found in the legal text. It includes a tangle of binding precedents, precedents, jurisprudential guidelines and normative precedents that guide practically all decisions issued by a judge of first instance. At the top of the pyramid, there are superior courts and, mainly, the STF, which, on many occasions, decides monocratically, which causes legal uncertainty throughout the system.