The Federal Justice decided to dismember the criminal process that investigates the responsibilities for the rupture of the dam of the mining company Vale in Brumadinho, Minas Gerais. It will be divided into three distinct processes that will proceed independently. Sixteen people are responsible for various environmental crimes and qualified intentional homicide. The tragedy, which turned four years old yesterday (25), caused the death of 270 people and several impacts on the Paraopeba River basin. Vale and the German consultancy Tüv Süd, which signed the dam’s stability report, are also being judged. The two companies can be punished with different sanctions. According to the decision of the 2nd Federal Criminal Court, one of the three cases covers all 16 defendants and will be dedicated exclusively to the investigation of crimes of qualified intentional homicide. In case of conviction in this judgment, the sentences can vary between 12 years and 30 years. The second process will investigate the occurrence of environmental crimes committed by Vale and the 11 defendants related to the mining company. The third will be aimed at prosecuting environmental crimes involving Tüv Süd and its five denounced employees. According to the Federal Court, the dismemberment, which will be adopted due to the complexity of the case, aims to facilitate the procedure, ensuring greater procedural speed. Responsibility for the breach of the dam was being judged by the Justice of Minas Gerais, based on a complaint by the Public Ministry of Minas Gerais (MPMG), based on an investigation by the Civil Police of the state, which indicted the 16 people. However, the Federal Supreme Court (STF) decided, last month, that the competence of the case is federal. In this way, the process practically restarted from scratch. As it is up to the Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office (MPF) to act at the federal level, the decision of the STF automatically removed the MPMG from the case. Two days ago, however, the MPF took the decision to resubmit the MPMG’s complaint in full, which was accepted on Tuesday (24) by Judge Raquel Vasconcelos Alves de Lima, of the 2nd Federal Criminal Court. It will be based on this complaint that the three processes will proceed. According to the complaint, a collusion between Vale and Tüv Süd resulted in the issuance of false declarations of condition of stability that were intended to serve as a shield for the mining company’s activities to remain secretly risky. The Justice of Minas Gerais has already forwarded the physical records, composed of 84 volumes, to the Federal Justice. Everything will be digitized and will be able to serve the three processes, which will only be processed electronically. New people can still be denounced, according to the MPF in a petition presented to the Federal Court. Since November 2021, the institution has had the results of a Federal Police investigation that indicted 19 people. As the names are still confidential, it is not possible to say if they coincide in part with the 16 indicted by the Civil Police of Minas Gerais, already denounced.
Agência Brasil
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