The minister, of the (Supreme Federal Court), collected controversies in the case against that of 2022.
The combative profile of the rapporteur minister was in evidence with the in court and reached the apex when due to contempt.
Since the beginning of the process, Moraes has had more support of colleagues behind the scenes than criticism of the way he has conducted criminal action. One of the ministers said to Sheet That the impartiality of the rapporteur cannot be confused with inertia in the search for truth.
Lawyers of the defendants, however, claim that the magistrate has not contemplated the constitutional guarantee of the contradictory. Experts point out that the conduct of the process has been exceptional, with different procedures from the usual.
The controversies grew over the past week-the first testimony of the criminal action witnesses against the group of which the former president () includes.
On the first day, General Freire Gomes presented to the Supreme one from Bolsonaro. There was also the perception among ministers that the former army chief tried in the testimony to exempt the.
Moraes interrupted the audience and hinted that the General lied. “The witness cannot omit what he knows. I will give the witness a chance to tell the truth,” he said.
The general replied that “after 50 years of army would never lie.” “I can’t infer what he [Garnier] I meant ‘being with the president’. I know exactly what I said and I say: he said he was with the president, and the intention of what he meant with that doesn’t fit me [interpretar].”
On Friday (23), the minister threatened to arrest Aldo Rebelo for contempt at the beginning of the statement. The former defense minister was analyzing the Portuguese language to argue that the accusation against Garnier that he would have “available” by Bolsonaro in the coup plot could be just a force of expression, without concrete effect.
“If you do not behave, you will be arrested for contempt,” said Moraes after interrupting Aldo and hearing as an answer “I do not admit censorship.”
Professor of Criminal Procedural Law at (University of São Paulo), Gustavo Badaró says that the Brazilian Code of Criminal Procedure underwent changes in 2008 to remove the protagonism of the judge in the testimony of the parties. According to the new rule, the judge became the last to ask additional questions at the hearing.
“What seems to the hearing, what went to the public, is a certain obstinacy of the judge in prior accusatory information,” says Badaró. “It seems that there was an insistence on confirming the first version [do general Freire Gomes] which was more accusatory than the second version, which looked milder. “
About Aldo’s case, the teacher points out that judges often warn witnesses considered more provocative than the testimony needs to be objective. “The witness can only express subjective impressions when it is inseparable from the factual narrative,” he adds.
The question, according to Badaró, is that the clashes “seem to take over the supreme to take an exaggerated protagonism in the production of the race.”
The professor of criminal law at UERJ (Rio de Janeiro State University) Davi Tangerino evaluates that the judge should maintain distance from the possible contradictions exposed by the witnesses.
“This objection of the contradiction should start from the [Paulo Gonet]. Judgment must abstain from prominent role in conducting the evidence, “says Tangerino. He points out, however, that the practice is recurring in the courts.
Prior to the opening of the process, another episode had already been questioned by the defenses. In 2024, in the investigation phase, Moraes threatened the whistleblower at an audience. “If there are a number of omissions and contradictions [nos depoimentos]”He said at the time.
The President of (Brazilian Bar Association), Beto Simonetti, told the Sheet which has been acting on the coup plot process whenever triggered by the lawyers involved in the criminal action.
“The OAB has been firmly acted in defense of the prerogatives of lawyers who work in this case whenever they formally record the news of a violation. Our priority will always defend the prerogatives of lawyers,” he said.
Defendants’ lawyers also point out other damage to the process. The main one would be in a hurry.
According to the defenses of Bolsonaro and the former minister, the Federal Police only began to make available the full data seized during the investigation on the 14th.
Compressed files have about 40 terabytes – volume that can even double after folders are unzipped. The process for downloading the material has been required up to five days, depending on the technological conditions of each office.
In practice, the defenses state that the calendar of testimony of the witnesses established by Moraes has prevented lawyers from analyzing the material seized by the PF looking for evidence of innocence.
It was based on this that Bolsonaro’s defense, led by lawyer Celso Vilardi, asked for the postponement of the testimonials last Friday.
The same assessment was made by the defense of Braga Netto, commanded by lawyer José Luis Oliveira Lima. “If messages have been highlighted from conversations to impute the alleged crimes to the applicant, it is inadmissible for the instruction to occur without this defense to use the full conversations of these same conversations,” he says in a petition sent to the Supreme.
Badaró says that the usual practice in criminal proceedings is to deliver all the material to the defense after offering the complaint by PGR. The exceptionality of the case, in his view, could not harm the right to the contradictory.
