DCM: What was Barbosa's role in the arrest of the Estadão reporter?
"Joaquim Barbosa already had a score to settle with Estadão. He mistreated a journalist from Estadão who asked him about the 90,000 reais in public money he spent on renovating the bathrooms in his official apartment in Brasília," recalls Diário do Centro do Mundo, commenting on the arrest of Claudia Trevisan, who was trying to interview him, in the United States.
From the Diary of the Center of the World - And the question everyone is asking is: what was Joaquim Barbosa's role in the episode that resulted in the five-hour arrest of Brazilian journalist Cláudia Trevisan, from Estadão?
It could be none, that's for sure. But speculation is multiplying.
Cláudia was trying to interview JB after a seminar he attended at Yale University in the United States. He had warned her that he would not speak to the media, so Cláudia planned to approach him as he was leaving.
The police showed up and arrested her. Handcuffed, she went through an embarrassing ordeal that included a cell in the police station where, to urinate, she had a toilet in which she could be observed by police officers.
Cláudia was accused of "trespassing," and she will still have a legal headache to deal with in the coming weeks. But she simply entered Yale, like so many others. She didn't "trespass."
According to his account, Joaquim Barbosa knew she would try to interview him. Did he ask the university administration to take steps to get rid of the unwanted reporter?
That's a hypothesis that makes sense.
Joaquim Barbosa already had a score to settle with Estadão. He mistreated a journalist from Estadão who asked him about the 90,000 reais in public money that he spent on renovating the bathrooms in his official apartment in Brasília.
The Yale case catches Joaquim Barbosa at a particularly bad time. He emerged demoralized from the sessions that resulted in the approval of the appeals for defendants in the Mensalão scandal.
He acted as a prosecutor, not as a judge; he engaged in legal trickery; he facilitated media pressure on magistrates, especially Celso de Mello – and with all this, he ended up miserably defeated.
The Veja cover that described him as "the poor boy who changed the country" has already become part of Brazilian journalistic anecdotes. Incidentally, until this morning, Veja readers were unaware of the arrest of the Estadão journalist, which had been reported even by rival Folha and Globo, a close friend of JB.
Modestly, DCM notes that information we independently published regarding another trip JB took, this time to Costa Rica, seems to have had an effect. He then sponsored a free meal for journalists using public funds, aboard a Brazilian Air Force plane.
This time, apparently, JB didn't take any journalists with him to write laudatory things about his trip.
That's progress.
But it would be even better if he dedicated his time not to visiting Yale, but to resolving cases that have been dragging on under his purview, such as the one concerning the old and forgotten Varig pensioners. JB hasn't changed Brazil and won't change it, but he can improve the hard lives of the Varig crowd.