The São Paulo Court of Justice will hold internal elections this Tuesday.
Nine judges are registered to run for four seats on the Special Body, the court's top collegiate body; two names nominated by President Ivan Sartori will seek re-election.
Fernando Porfírio _247 – The hardline policy implemented in the São Paulo Court of Justice will be put to the test this Tuesday, the 26th, when two well-known "hawks" of President Ivan Sartori will face the scrutiny of 360 judges to return to the Special Body. The internal election of the judiciary will choose the occupants of four seats in the most important political-administrative arm of the São Paulo Judiciary.
The Special Panel is the highest collegiate body of the largest court of justice in Latin America. It is composed of 25 judges, of whom 12 are elected by direct vote, and the other 12 are chosen from among the most senior magistrates serving on the court. The president of the court is also part of the group. The Special Panel has jurisdiction to judge the governor, state secretaries, state deputies, prosecutors and public attorneys, magistrates, and members of the Court of Auditors.
In the election, three seats for career judges and one for someone who entered the court through the constitutional quota for lawyers will be at stake. Two of the main "hawks" in the policy adopted by Sartori are seeking re-election: judges Guilherme Strenger and Ruy Coppola. The group has also put forward the name of judge Itamar Gaino in an attempt to win the third seat.
So far, nine judges have registered for the election. They are: Itamar Gaino, Ruy Coppola, Luis Antonio Ganzerla, Guilherme Strenger, Zélia Maria Antunes Alves, Paulo Dimas Marcaretti, Luiz Augusto Salles Vieira, Maria Cristina Zucchi, and Roberto Mac Cracken. The first seven are competing for the three judicial positions, and the last two for the single seat reserved for lawyers.
In betting circles, Mac Cracken's reappointment to the Special Body is considered a certainty. He has significant support in the Private Law Section, which accounts for more than half of the São Paulo judges. His opponent, Maria Cristina Zucchi, is known as a solo candidate (without the support of a significant political group in the court). In the last election, held in 2010 when the opponents were the same, Mac Cracken obtained 155 votes, while Zucchi garnered the support of only 72 magistrates.
The fight is fiercest among career judicial candidates. In this case, there is a significant effort to re-elect the "hawks" to the panel. The contest will assess the performance of this group during the grueling procedure of the so-called "million-dollar group." The case led to the opening of disciplinary proceedings against five judges – including two former presidents of the court – and the removal from judicial duties of Judge Penteado Navarro, who chaired the budget committee during the administrations of Vallim Bellocchi and Viana Santos.
In a session held at the end of May, the Special Body concluded that there is "strong evidence against the five defendants that they carried out parallel activities in the management of the court and committed a series of illicit acts." In a vote read at the trial session, President Ivan Sartori said that the magistrates acted with misconduct, committing abuses in favor of cronies, including advisors, drivers, and other employees, which resulted in the payment of large sums of money and serious violations of the principles of morality and impartiality, to which the Constitution demands unrestricted obedience.
The opinion presented by Judge Ivan Sartori indicated that two former presidents of the Court of Justice and three members of the former budget committee were involved in the self-payment of millionaire salaries. According to Sartori, "there is evidence of serious violations of the principles of morality" and that "the advance payments were made in a way that was not equal to that of other magistrates."
Coppola and Strenger are two prominent leaders in the new realignment of political forces within the judiciary. The former works in the Private Law Section, the largest in the Court; the latter, in the Criminal Law Section. Strenger is a mortal enemy of the group led by Penteado Navarro, ever since the latter defeated his candidate, Antonio Manssur, in the election for the Criminal Section of the São Paulo court last year. Strenger awaits the opportunity to retaliate against Navarro's group, the current president of the Regional Electoral Court of São Paulo.
Ruy Coppola is a purebred "hawk." During the administration of former president José Roberto Bedran, he held the position of sheriff, responsible for the uproar caused within the judiciary by the implementation of Resolution 542/2011. This resolution regulated compliance with Goal 2 of the National Council of Justice (CNJ). Coppola oversaw the productivity control of the judges who became known as "short arms," for holding back appeals that had been languishing in their offices for years without being submitted for judgment.
Coppola set performance targets and sanctions for those who failed to comply with the resolution. Masters of their own kingdoms, some judges were outraged by their colleague's interference. Because of his intervention, some labeled him an "executioner."
Among career judges, Strenger and Coppola are seeking another two-year term on the Special Body. They were first elected in 2010 with significant votes. Strenger was the winner with 172 votes, followed by Coppola with 158. Now they will face five more competitors: Itamar Gaino, Luis Antonio Ganzerla, Zélia Maria Antunes Alves, Paulo Dimas Marcaretti, and Luiz Augusto Salles Vieira.
The "hawks" are working on the hypothesis of winning at least two of the three career judge positions that are up for grabs. They don't consider the third vacancy lost yet and are working to beat a competitor from the Public Law Section. Judge Zélia Maria Antunes Alves is seen as an unlikely candidate, and the same assessment is made of Luiz Salles Vieira and Luis Ganzerla. The unknown factor is Judge Paulo Dimas Mascaretti, who previously served as president of the São Paulo Magistrates Association (Apamagis).
The election is governed by Resolution 301/07. According to the rule, when a vacancy arises, the president of the Court of Justice must convene the Full Court — composed of the 360 judges — to choose the new occupant. By this rule, judges who are members of the Special Body based on seniority are ineligible.
The election was organized in the same format as elections for Executive and Legislative positions, using electronic voting machines. The vote was secret, and those elected obtained a simple majority of the votes.
Constitutional Amendment 45/04, known as the Judicial Reform, stipulated that half of the members of the Special Bodies of the courts must be elected by direct vote of the judges.