STF makes defendants accused of 8/1, but ministers disagree – 04/25/2023 – Power

The justices of the STF (Federal Supreme Court) concluded on the night of this Monday (24) the judgment of the first wave of those accused of participating in the coup attacks of January 8. They made one hundred defendants accused of being executors and masterminds of the acts.

Seven ministers followed the understanding of the rapporteur, Alexandre de Moraes, for receiving the complaints against all the accused.

The two nominees of former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL), ministers Kassio Nunes Marques and André Mendonça, partially disagreed with Moraes and defended that only the denunciations of the alleged executors of the acts should be accepted —in the case of Kassio, even so with a series of caveats.

The other ministers voted with Moraes: Luís Roberto Barroso, Dias Toffoli, Gilmar Mendes, Edson Fachin, Cármen Lúcia, Luiz Fux and Rosa Weber.

The first wave of denouncements on January 8 is made up of 50 people investigated in the inquiry of the executors and another 50 in the action of the instigators and masterminds.

Kassio and Mendonça cast their votes in the two inquiries under review hours before the end of the trial period in the virtual plenary, which ended on Monday night.

The first divergence of the two is in relation to the forum of the trial. Both consider that the action should be analyzed by the Federal Court of the Federal District, not by the STF.

In case the competence of the Supreme Court is recognized, as it was by the majority of ministers, they argue that there are no elements to accept the complaints about those accused of being instigators and intellectual authors of the attacks

Regarding the instigators and intellectual authors, Kassio argued that the group is formed by the demonstrators who were at the Army HQ in Brasília and “remained there, with no elements to point out that they had participated, in any way, in the acts of vandalism that occurred in the Square of the Three Powers”.

“With the most respectful bows, from everything that has been exposed, I understand that it is not possible to characterize the just cause for the initiation of the criminal action backed by the simple fact that someone is camped or ‘in the vicinity of the Army Headquarters’ in Brasilia, without that even a criminal conduct attributed to the denounced is demonstrated and individualized”, wrote the magistrate.

Regarding those accused of carrying out the attacks, Kassio made a series of reservations. Besides defending that the competence of the case does not belong to the STF, he said that only part of the crimes imputed should be recognized: in the case, “damage qualified by violence and serious threat, with the use of flammable substance, against the patrimony of the Union and with considerable harm to the victim”; “violent abolition of the democratic rule of law”; and “deterioration of listed heritage”.

In this sense, the minister also said that accusations of crimes of “armed criminal association” and “coup d’état” should not be recognized.

In a lecture at the IASP (Institute of Lawyers of São Paulo), this Monday (24), Mendonça had already indicated that he could differ from the majority. He even stated that he faced a “dilemma when judging the group of detainees in front of the Army Command the day after the acts would become defendants.

He said that it was necessary to distinguish the situation of this group from that of the 50 people who were arrested for direct involvement in the acts of depredation in the Praça dos Três Poderes.

The magistrate also stated that he would not give in to pressure and recalled the judgment of former deputy Daniel Silveira, accused of offending ministers of the Supreme Court.

Mendonça, however, voted to receive the complaint against the alleged perpetrators in relation to all the crimes charged. “Here [no inquérito dos executores], the arrests took place in the midst of acts of violence, depredation, confrontation, fear, hustle and bustle. On the other hand, the arrests of the following day took place in a completely different context”, wrote the minister in his vote.

The Supreme analyzed in recent days the first wave of judgments of the 1,390 people denounced by the PGR (Attorney General of the Republic) for participating in the attacks. The trial began to be held in the court’s virtual plenary on Tuesday (18).

Rapporteur of the investigation, Moraes maintained the existence of just cause for the opening of criminal proceedings against all the accused.

At the request of the minister, the President of the Supreme Court, Rosa Weber, has already guided the analysis of a second package of accusations by the PGR. 200 cases will be analyzed in a trial that will begin next Tuesday (25) and will also have a period of one week.

In his vote, the reporting minister stated that part of the defendants, as pointed out by the Attorney General’s Office, were part of the nucleus responsible for carrying out material attacks against the headquarters of the three Powers.

According to Moraes, others joined, through a stable and permanent structure set up in front of the Brazilian Army Headquarters, “to the criminal desires of the other co-authors, with the aim of abruptly modifying the current regime”.

Still according to the demonstration, there was an interest in encouraging the Armed Forces and the population to seize power and subvert the political and social order, also generating animosities between the military and republican institutions.

Moraes reiterated that there are no doubts about the competence of the STF to analyze the complaints and, if they are received, to prosecute and judge the criminal action.