Lula da Silva and PT chief Hoffmann hit with fresh corruption charges

Tuesday, May 1st 2018 - 07:09 UTC

Full article 73 comments

Authorities allege that Lula, along with Senator Gleisi Hoffmann, were given access to a US$40 million slush fund in 2010 funded by construction company Odebrecht

Imprisoned former Brazilian President Lula da Silva, along with the current leader of the Workers Party he founded, was hit on Monday with fresh corruption charges by federal prosecutors.

Authorities allege that Lula, along with Senator Gleisi Hoffmann, who is leading the beleaguered Workers Party, were given access to a US$40 million slush fund in 2010 funded by construction company Odebrecht, in exchange for government decisions that would benefit the company.

The Workers Party said in a statement that the accusations were unfounded. Also charged in the alleged scheme were Antonio Palocci, who served as Finance Minister under Lula and who last week signed a plea deal with prosecutors, along with Paulo Bernardo, who was Lula’s planning minister. Palocci has been in jail since 2016 and was found guilty in a different graft trial last year.

Lula was jailed on April 7 and is serving a 12-year sentence for a bribery conviction. The former leader already faces another six separate trials on graft charges.

Hoffmann and Bernardo, her husband, are both also facing a separate trial in the sweeping Lava Jato corruption probe, an unprecedented push against corruption in Latin America’s biggest economy that has seen scores of powerful politicians and businessmen jailed for corruption.

Categories: Politics, Brazil.

Tags: Antonio Palocci, Brazil, Brazil corruption, Brazil Workers Party, Gleisi Helena Hoffmann, Lava Jato, Lula da Silva, Odebrecht bribery case.

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:o))
REF: “hit with FRESH corruption charges”:

GREAT!
- And whatever in the world happened to the STALE corruption charges?
- Did they [or anyone else] RETURN the stolen wealth?
May 01st, 2018 - 12:39 pm +2
:o))
@EM & @DT:

REF: “If/when the STF really revokes the immunity, we'll get to see if things will really be different and how impartial or otherwise the courts are”:

NO band of crooks [NO network of racketeers] - even if they are NOT ruling any country - will be willing to give up their benefits, their privileges, their rights; unless there is some kind of a compromise - a give-and-take - an exchange of favors [in THEIR favor, of course]! Having said that: It's just a question of time to discover which loopholes were purposefully created [by the crooks & for the crooks] to profit from and to escape from any charges.
May 03rd, 2018 - 03:52 pm +1
Terence Hill
Bonehead
“Used a wrong example to a country [where the judges & votes] are bought” “That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.” Christopher Hitchens
On the contrary the US legal system, while far from perfect, is light years ahead of the dysfunctional pretence of a legal system they have in Brazil.
May 05th, 2018 - 09:15 pm +1

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