Yousseff will ask for back R$176 million seized in Lava Jato

Money changer Alberto Yousseff will ask, in court, for the return of R$176 million blocked or seized during the Lava Jato operation, in which he was a defendant after being named as one of the main operators of the corruption scheme. The information was published on the Look this Saturday (28).

The money changer, who managed to annul part of his processes as part of the operation, had signed a plea bargain agreement in which he handed over assets such as real estate, cars and cash to the court. According to the media outlet, part of the funds seized from the money changer and which should have been in judicial accounts had disappeared.

Yousseff was arrested in March 2014 in one of the phases of the operation, identified by the Federal Public Ministry (MPF) as the main bribery operator in the scheme. During the Petrobras CPI held by the Chamber of Deputies in 2015, he said that he was not the mastermind behind the irregularities investigated in Lava Jato, but that he operated as a cog in the scheme. “I was not the mentor, but a cog in this process,” he told the Commission.

One of Yousseff’s last victories in court occurred in August 2024, when, by a majority of votes, the 5th Panel of the Superior Court of Justice (STJ) overturned the measure that determined the money changer’s electronic ankle bracelet monitoring. The decision of the collegiate was in habeas corpus ex officio due to excessive execution of the sentence.

The award-winning collaboration agreement signed with the Federal Supreme Court (STF) in 2015 provided for the uninterrupted use of the electronic device for 27 years with the need to remain at home on holidays and weekends from 11pm to 6am. However, last month the majority of judges understood that you cannot wear an ankle bracelet for more than two decades when analyzing that the surveillance measure affects fundamental rights “even worse than the prison sentence”.