Unanimously, the First Panel of the Federal Supreme Court (STF) decided today (6) to reject a complaint filed by the Attorney General’s Office (PGR) against the President of the Chamber of Deputies, Arthur Lira (PP-AL), for passive corruption. When judging an appeal filed by Lira’s defense, the collegiate reviewed its own decision, which, in 2019, made Lira defendant on the charge of receiving R$ 106,000 in bribes in kind. The case dates back to 2012, when one of the deputy’s parliamentary advisors was caught at Congonhas Airport, in São Paulo, trying to fly to Brasília with the amount. After the occurrence, Arthur Lira admitted to having paid for the adviser’s round-trip tickets to the capital of São Paulo, but claimed not to know about the money. The complaint also stated that the bribe was paid by the then president of the Companhia Brasileira de Trens Urbanos (CBTU), Francisco Colombo, with the aim of raising political support to remain in office. Votes First to vote, Minister André Mendonça expressed his rejection of the complaint and pointed out the emergence of new facts after the 2019 trial. To justify his manifestation, the minister said that the PGR changed its understanding of the process. According to the internal regulations of the STF, Mendonça could not vote on the issue because he had succeeded the former rapporteur, Justice Marco Aurélio. However, unanimously, the collegiate decided that he could speak out on the issue in view of the new facts that emerged. Then, ministers Dias Toffoli, Alexandre de Moraes, Luiz Fux and Luís Roberto Barroso followed the same understanding. Defense Arthur Lira’s defense stated in the process that the investigations were unable to prove that the deputy acted in the sense of “receiving” and that the accusations were based only on the word of a whistleblower known to be “the deputy’s enemy”.
Agência Brasil
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