Gabriela Hardt asks for removal and may leave Lava Jato – 05/25/2023 – Politics

The 13th Federal Court of Curitiba, which houses the remaining processes of the Lava Jato Operation in Paraná, may have a new change. Judge Gabriela Hardt, who since the beginning of this week has been acting on the court in place of removed judge Eduardo Appio, is enrolled in a removal contest and may leave judgments involving cases of corruption at Petrobras.

According to the TRF-4 (Federal Regional Court of the 4th Region), Gabriela Hardt “expressed an interest in running for removal, as well as several other magistrates”, but there is still a deadline for eventual withdrawal, until next Monday ( 29).

“There is no way to have a definition, at this moment, that the magistrate will be able to remove herself, even because she may withdraw. After the closing of the terms, the process is instructed and taken to judgment by the Board of Directors. Only after judging the deed by the collegiate, it will remain sanctioned, so, eventual removal”, says the TRF-4 note.

In the Federal Court responsible for Lava Jato, the judge is a substitute, a term that refers not to the condition of alternate or “reserve”, but to the stage in the career of a magistrate.

She even conducted the cases of the operation temporarily between 2018 and 2019, after Moro left the judiciary, and proved to be aligned with the theses of the current senator.

Hardt, for example, issued the sentence that condemned Lula to prison in the criminal action at the Atibaia site (SP), in a measure that was later annulled by the Federal Supreme Court.

Later, when the head of the Court was Luiz Antônio Bonat, she was dispatched to Lava Jato in an “assistance regime” for her colleague, a function that included evaluating requests for arrest and breaches of secrecy.

Her stay now at the head of the operation’s cases is also temporary.

In the case of the site, the magistrate copied excerpts from Moro’s sentence in the trial of the triplex case of Guarujá. In the judgment on the site, the judge even mentioned the term “apartment”.

The word, admitted the judge, was in Moro’s sentence and was not changed due to personal error. “I did above and in the review I forgot to take that word out,” Hardt said at the time. “I made the sentence myself. All her faults are mine.”

Appio, in charge of the Lava Jato processes since February, was temporarily removed on Monday (22), in the midst of a preliminary procedure by the Internal Affairs of the TRF-4, and which must still lead to the initiation of an administrative disciplinary process against the judge, after the presentation of a prior defense.

Appio has 15 days to explain the reasons for his alleged phone call in April to the son of the former Lava Jato rapporteur on second instance, Marcelo Malucelli. In the phone call, the judge would have pretended to be someone else, apparently trying to prove the kinship bond to ask the colleague to leave the post.

The interlocutor who would be Appio ends the call abruptly, after asking Malucelli’s son if he “has been up to it”, in a tone that can be interpreted as a threat, according to members of the TRF-4 court.

João Eduardo is also a partner of Senator Sergio Moro (União Brasil-PR), a former Lava Jato judge, and Federal Deputy Rosangela Moro (União Brasil-SP), at the Wolff Moro Sociedade de Advocacia office. He is also the boyfriend of the couple’s daughter.

Marcelo Malucelli’s indirect relationship with Moro was the subject of disputes and the magistrate ended up leaving the Lava Jato rapporteurship, after overturning a series of decisions signed by Judge Appio in the first degree of Federal Justice.