O Court of Justice of Rio de Janeiro (TJRJ) accepted this Monday (15) the complaint from the Public Prosecutor’s Office and made the state deputy a defendant Lucinha and his former parliamentary advisor, Ariane Afonso Limafor alleged relationship with the militia of Luís Antônio da Silva Braga, known as Zinho.
According to the MP’s complaint from June last year, the parliamentarian and the former advisor were part of the gang’s political group.
According to messages intercepted by the PF, the parliamentarian was called “godmother” by Zinho’s paramilitaries, due to her facilitation and assistance to the group.
In a note, the Special Body of the Court stated that the deputy and the former advisor are accused of involvement with the militia called “Tropa do Z”, “Bonde do Zinho” or “Família Braga”, which operates in neighborhoods in the West Zone of Rio, such as Campo Grande, Paciência, Cosmos, Inhoaíba, Guaratiba and Santa Cruz.
Zinho was the most wanted militiaman in Rio, and handed himself in in December 2023.
In June this year, in the maximum security unit in Brasília.
The scheme
According to investigations, the militia was made up of an operational nucleus, divided into three other groups, namely:
- main leaders;
- local leaders, with specific action in dominated areas; and
- advisors, also known as soldiers or informants, linked to the main leadership and responsible for contacting members of the security forces, carrying out patrols and security, among other functions.
From this operation, two other nuclei were identified, the financial one, intended for money laundering, and the political nucleus, of which Lucinha and Ariane were part, where the objective was to defend the interests of criminals before the Public Power.
In one of the excerpts of the complaint, the MP says that in “multiple episodes” the interference of those accused in the political sphere, together with police and political authorities, is clear.
Among the episodes, the complaint describes that, in July 2021, both provided the group with privileged information related to the visit schedule of the mayor of Rio, Eduardo Paes, to the West Zone, allowing the militia members to remove their members from the streets of places dominated by the organization.
There was also an attempt to interfere with the mayor and other municipal authorities to maintain the so-called “P5 Loophole” in municipal alternative public transport, the militia’s biggest source of direct funding. Therefore, the group could explore the service outside the determined itinerary, increasing revenue from the vans.
The complaint also mentions that, in November 2021, the deputy provided assistance to members of “Bonde do Zinho” arrested in the act, to release them from prison.
The parliamentarian and her former advisor must be held accountable for the crime of forming a private militia, the penalty for which varies from 5 to 10 years and a fine, in addition to the loss of their position.
A CNN He sought the deputy’s advice, but did not receive a response until the publication of this report.
