MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

STF investigations against Lula shelved

Lewandowski found the evidence insufficient to proceed with the investigations

Brazil's Supreme Federal Court (STF) Justice Ricardo Lewandowski ordered the closing of three preliminary investigations in the extinct Lava Jato and Zelotes Operation against President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Agencia Brasil reported.

Lewandowski's decision encompassed investigations concerning donations to the Lula Institute from contractors Odebrecht, the purchase of land for the institute, and alleged irregularities in the purchase of Swedish fighter jets for the Air Force under former President Dilma Rousseff.

The first two inquiries had been suspended since September 2021 by order of the STF. The investigation into alleged influence peddling by Lula in the purchase of the F-39 Gripen fighter jets had been suspended in March of last year.

In his ruling, Lewandowski said that the evidence presented in the lawsuits was illegal and there was therefore no reason for the lawsuits to continue. He classified the evidence as “riddled with irreparable defects and clearly lacking minimum evidential basis.”

The definitive suspension of investigations had been requested by Lula's defense in the process of annulment of evidence contained in the leniency agreement between Odebrecht and the Lava Jato task force prosecutors at the Federal Prosecutor's Office.

The requests were based on material seized by the Federal Police's Operation Spoofing, which busted a group of hackers who broke into the cell phones of judges and Lava Jato prosecutors.

“Examined vertically the factual-legal mosaic described in detail above, I do not conceive the existence of reckless accusations, without the minimum of elements of sound evidence [...], and also known to lack legitimate correlation between them and pre-procedural phase. It is, in fact, accusations based on contaminated evidence, which were produced, stored, and used in an illicit and illegitimate manner, which shows the absence of just cause for its continuation,” Lewandowski wrote in the decision.

(Source: Agencia Brasil)