The defenses of the defendants who were members of the —responsible, according to the PGR (Attorney General’s Office), for the attempted coup d’état at the end of the (PL) government— stated to the STF (Supreme Federal Court) that the prosecution was unable to prove the participation of their clients in the coup plot.
In general, the lawyers claim that the accusation was based on little evidence, insufficient for conviction, in addition to disregarding acquittal evidence presented by the defenses in the file and even testimonies from witnesses and the whistleblower Mauro Cid.
The First Panel of the court heard the lawyers of 6 of the 10 defendants in the group, in addition to . The panel will resume the oral arguments of the remaining 4 people involved this Wednesday morning (12).
The group is made up of a federal police officer and nine military personnel, most of these officers with training in special forces — the so-called “”.
Lawyer Diogo Musy, for General Estevam Theophilo, stated that the PGR’s accusation was based only on a single message from Lieutenant Colonel Mauro Cid about the military’s alleged participation in the coup plot.
Theophilo was called by former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL) to a meeting at Palácio da Alvorada, on December 9, 2022. While the meeting was taking place, Mauro Cid was talking to Colonel Bernardo Romão Correa Netto via WhatsApp.
Cid said that Theophilo was in favor of the coup d’état. “But he wants to do it… As long as Pr signs it,” wrote Bolsonaro’s former aide-de-camp.
The PGR argued that the whistleblower “reiterated, with confidence, that he heard from the defendant Estevam Theophilo himself about his adherence to the coup attempt”.
Musy said that Cid lied in his statement and that the PGR was unable to prove Theophilo’s consent to the coup plot. He stated that the complaint fails to say that Theophilo could move soldiers to carry out illegal orders because the Land Operations Command, the body he commands in the Army, has no evidence available.
“[É errado] try to imbue Theophilo with an abusive, conspiratorial profile, responsible for underground operations in sensitive environments”, said the lawyer. “How will we have, in a democratic process, the guarantee of full defense if the highest of the prosecution bodies has no criteria of rigor and truth with what it is narrating?”
Correa Netto’s defense also criticized the PGR. The soldier is accused of meeting with soldiers trained in special operations — the so-called “black kids” — to put together pressure strategies against military leaders, with the aim of advancing the coup plans.
Lawyer Ruyter Barcelos stated that the accusation is absurd because it states that a colonel would have the ability to influence four-star generals, contradicting the military principles of hierarchy and discipline.
“Which general officer of the Army High Command was approached by Colonel Correa Netto? None. We heard in the accusatory phase the former military commander of the South, the defendant’s immediate boss. And the question was also direct: did he approach? No.”
Fabrício Moreira de Bastos was defended by Marcelo César Cordeiro. The lawyer also questioned the lack of evidence of the colonel’s actions. According to him, it would be necessary to have procedural loyalty, in relation to the evidence produced within the process
“What the defense invokes is procedural loyalty, in relation to the evidence produced within the process, what we invoke is loyalty to the statements of the cooperating defendant, which served to convict many, but must also serve to acquit those who have no relation to the acts here.”
“The perplexity lies in the fact that the PGR did not have the greatness to use the collaborator’s statements to condemn and then, in this core, also use them to condemn or to absolve”, he said.
Hélio Ferreira Lima’s lawyer, Luciano Pereira Alves de Souza, stated that the document called “Desenho Op Luneta” was a theoretical study.
According to the PGR, the military led field actions to monitor and neutralize public authorities. During interrogation, the lieutenant colonel stated that the document he found was produced by him during intelligence work in the 6th Division of , in .
“No line in the Luneta operational design predicted institutional breakdown. It could never be interpreted as a coup plan by an officer. It would need to go through commanders to become a plan and not a theoretical study,” he stated.
One of the goals established in the document was to “neutralize Min AM’s ability to act”, in reference to . He also spoke of “carrying out the preventive detention of supreme judges considered to be generating instability.”
The Luneta Operational Design also provided for the creation of central and state crisis offices and support in holding new presidential elections.
“What is the PGR’s evidence about the presentation of a plan? Did they have a computer? PowerPoint? All the evidence in the records says that there was nothing. I only need one. We gathered countless pieces of evidence and they were all disregarded,” he said.
The military would be in the group that would have monitored Moraes. Cordeiro states, however, that the trips to Brasília are explained by the colonel’s family context. He would have gone from Goiânia to Brasília to help set up his son’s apartment and see his youngest graduate.
Lawyer Rafael Favetti, who defends Colonel Marcio Nunes de Resende Junior, said that the reserve officer was not an interlocutor and was not mentioned by others involved in the part of the complaint that addresses the meeting in which the letter was created to pressure the Armed Forces command to join the coup.
“Macio is not involved with a green and yellow dagger, he is not involved with a spyglass. He is accused solely and solely of having participated in a meeting that other colleagues said was a fraternization in which he had endorsed a letter to the commander to put pressure on him.”
The meeting took place in the party room of the soldier’s father’s building. According to the lawyer, this happened by coincidence at the Army HQ, when Correa Netto found out about the space and asked for it to be made available.
