Collor accuses Gurgel of malfeasance in the Cachoeira case.

The Senate Agency - In a speech on the Senate floor, Senator Fernando Collor (PTB-AL) said he considered the written responses from the Attorney General of the Republic, Roberto Gurgel, submitted to the Joint Parliamentary Inquiry Commission (CPI) investigating the illegal gambling operator Carlinhos Cachoeira, to be unsatisfactory.

Collor, the main advocate for the prosecutor's appearance before the CPI (Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry), stated that Gurgel's answers only reinforce indications that the prosecutor may have committed crimes of responsibility and prevarication. Defined in the Penal Code, the crime of prevarication means "unduly delaying or failing to perform an official act, or performing it against an express provision of law, to satisfy a personal interest or feeling."

In his response to parliamentarians, Gurgel reaffirms that he made the right decision in suspending, in 2009, the investigation of Operation Vegas, by the Federal Police, which investigated an illegal gambling scheme run by Cachoeira. The operation's files were sent to the Attorney General's Office due to the involvement of people with privileged jurisdiction.

"The fact is that, until now, no one has explained why he and Deputy Attorney General Cláudia Sampaio Marques have not taken any action regarding that process. In this case of omission, there is indeed evidence of the crime of prevarication and, at the very least, administrative misconduct for failing to meet the deadlines to which prosecutors are subject," the senator said, commenting on the response sent to the CPI (Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry).

Gurgel argues in the document that "there was no criminally relevant fact" that could justify the initiation of an investigation in the Supreme Federal Court (STF). The prosecutor also states that forwarding the investigation to the STF could jeopardize the continuation of the investigations with Operation Monte Carlo, which followed Operation Vegas.

For Collor, however, Gurgel did not help the progress of the investigations and even hindered the process in the 11th Federal Court of Goiás.

"If, in his view, there were no criminally relevant facts attributed to authorities with special jurisdiction, then the prosecutor should have requested further investigations or sought more information. After all, it was not for nothing that the federal judge in Anápolis ordered the case files to be sent to the Attorney General's Office, with a view, of course, to the Supreme Federal Court," Collor argued.

Veja magazine

The senator also reiterated his request for the CPI to summon journalist Policarpo Júnior, head of the magazine's branch office. Veja in Brasília, and the owner of the publication, Roberto Civita. According to Collor, there are indications that the prosecutors responsible for Operations Vegas and Monte Carlo leaked confidential information from the investigations to journalists at the weekly magazine. For Collor, it is necessary to know to what extent the magazine's journalistic activity regarding Cachoeira was limited to contact with the source.

In my view, this magazine Veja"His underhanded methods, which have persisted for more than two decades, could be the thread we must pull to unravel this tangle of shady dealings by Carlos Cachoeira and the prevarication, or at least the lack of professional responsibility, of Mr. Roberto Gurgel," said Collor.