STJ unlocks revision of J&F’s leniency agreement – 03/16/2023 – Market

The STJ (Superior Court of Justice) ordered the process of revising the value of the leniency agreement signed between J&F, the company that controls the food giant JBS, and the MPF (Federal Public Ministry).

This Thursday (16), the court denied the company’s request to keep the review process paralyzed.

Due to this freeze, determined by the Federal Regional Court of the 1st Region (TRF-1), the payment of installments by J&F was delayed. The order would remain valid until the entry of Funcef and Petros as parties to the review action is judged.

However, despite this Thursday’s decision, the company will not have to pay these amounts immediately.

The president of the STJ, Minister Maria Thereza de Assis Moura, said this Thursday that “pecuniary sanctions cannot fail to be honoured” just because, at the same time, the participation or not of pension funds in the process is being discussed. However, the judge’s decision does not cover the making of payments, only the continuation of the review action.

Sought, the company did not respond until the publication of the report.

J&F signed leniency —a kind of award-winning delation aimed at companies— in 2017 with the MPF. Companies controlled by it were targeted by the Greenfield, Sépsis, Cui Bono and Carne Fraca operations, by the Federal Police and the MPF.

Under the terms of the agreement, the company undertook to reimburse R$ 10.3 billion (in values ​​at the time) to the injured institutions — Caixa Econômica Federal, FGTS, Funcef, Petros, BNDES and União.

However, according to the STJ, after having voluntarily signed the agreement with the MPF, J&F pointed out alleged illegalities in the calculation of the fines and filed an action to revise the established values.

So far, the company has not detailed in the process what the failures are and does not even point to a new figure that it considers correct.

In November last year, the president of the STJ determined the continuation of the review action in response to a request from the BNDES. J&F, however, unsuccessfully appealed the decision.

The development bank went to court after the TRF-1 paralyzed the review process and also the payment of installments. In response, the BNDES filed an appeal with the STJ for the review action to proceed regardless of the request from the Funcef and Petros pension funds.