The Supreme Court says the arrest of a businessman in the Lava Jato corruption scandal was unnecessary.
The Second Panel of the Brazilian Supreme Court (STF) deemed the preventive detention of businessman Eduardo Aparecido de Meira in Operation Lava Jato illegal and unnecessary. Convicted in the first instance by Judge Sergio Moro for creating a shell company to funnel bribes, he had already been behind bars for a year and a half. Ministers Ricardo Lewandowski and Gilmar Mendes voted in favor of his release, while Luiz Edson Fachin and the court's senior member, Celso de Mello, dissented. Meira was arrested at the same time as José Dirceu and, in March, was sentenced to 8 years in prison.
Conjur The Second Panel of the Supreme Federal Court deemed the preventive detention of a businessman in the "Lava Jato" operation illegal and unnecessary. Convicted in the first instance by Judge Sergio Moro—for creating a shell company to funnel bribes—businessman Eduardo Aparecido de Meira had already been behind bars for a year and a half.
He entered a kind of legal limbo generated by the STF's own understanding regarding the granting of Habeas Corpus, as reported by ConJur. This Tuesday (October 3), however, after a tie in the panel, he obtained HC — according to the principle of in dubio pro reo, a tie benefits the accused.
Ministers Ricardo Lewandowski and Gilmar Mendes voted in favor of freedom, while Luiz Edson Fachin and the court's senior member, Celso de Mello, dissented. Minister Dias Toffoli did not participate in the session. By extension, the panel also granted freedom to Flávio Henrique de Oliveira Macedo.
The defense was handled by lawyer Fernando Araneo, partner at Leite, Tosto e Barros Advogados.
In voting for their release, the ministers argued that there was no longer any reason to keep the two defendants in custody, since the evidence-gathering phase was complete and, in Meira's case, there is already a sentence condemning him and an appeal pending review at the Federal Regional Court of the 4th Region.
Lewandowski and Mendes also said that there is no reason to anticipate the defendant's sentence, leaving decisions about possible precautionary measures to the 13th Federal Court of Curitiba, under Judge Sergio Moro.
Meira was arrested at the same time as José Dirceu. In March, he was sentenced to 8 years in prison for money laundering. On May 30th of this year, a request to extend the habeas corpus granted to the former minister a month earlier was denied.