Relief in Brasilia. Frustration in Washington. Despite the threats and sanctions of the US government, the Supreme Federal Court (STF) has just sentenced Jair Bolsonaro to Jair Bolsonaro, former president of Brazil, for a coup attempt. For the first time in the history of the South American country, a former president faces prison sentences for having threatened against the country’s democracy.
After three days of tense judgment against the eight defendants of the so -called hard core of the coup attempt, Judge Carmen Lúzia has voted Thursday in favor of condemning the former president of Brazil for the five crimes for which he was accused by the State Attorney General’s Office. The judge considered Jair Bolsonaro guilty and the rest of the defendants of coup attempt and violent abolition of the democratic state of law, the two strongest positions, as well as the formation of armed criminal organization and two charges related to damage and deterioration of state heritage.
Carmen Lúzia’s vote leaves the vote count in 3 magistrates in favor of the conviction and one against, making the change of the result impossible, because there is hardly any vote of the Christian Judge Zanín. Last Tuesday the magistrates Alexandre de Moraes (rapporteur of the process of the coup plot at the STF) and Flávio Dino voted in favor of the conviction. On Wednesday, Luiz Fux voted against.
The final result was a relief for the Brazilian Supreme and for the Government of Progressive Lula da Silva. On Tuesday, Karoline Leavitt, spokesman for the White House, said that the United States government studies new measures against Brazil in case Bolsonaro was convicted and came to insinuate that President Donald Trump could “use military media” to defend freedom of expression in the world. On Wednesday, the judge of Supreme Luiz Fux, with a clear punitivist record, surprised to lash out hard against the judicial process against Bolsonaro. Fux, whose negative vote was expected, said that the Supreme Court was not the appropriate space for the trial and compared the process with the persecution of “witches, heretics and Jews”, with words similar to those used by Donald Trump. Fux’s vote, held by the Trump government, gave wings to the defense lawyers of Jair Bolsonaro and serves as fuel for the radical wing of the Bolsonarism.
“I know him quite well, he was a good president of Brazil.” Trump said after a question before the media in the White House this Thursday, says Andrés Gil: “It is very surprising that this could happen. It is very similar to what they tried to do with me, but they did not get his way. But I can only say this: I met him as president of Brazil, he was a good man.”
The US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, threatened Brazil: “The political persecution of the Human Rights Violator Alexandre de Moraes continues: he and other members of the Supreme Court of Brazil have unfairly decided to imprison former President Jair Bolsonaro. The United States will respond as corresponds to this witch hunt.”
Giro from Trump
With a virulent and ironic tone, Luiz Fuz justified his vote along an exhibition of more than 13 hours. The minister’s arguments, which exempt Jair Bolsonaro from any responsibility in the coup attempt, entered into contradiction with the position that until then had been defending. If Fux on Wednesday he described the events of January 8, 2023 in Brasilia as the fruit of a “messy mob”, In March I accused them of serious anti -democratic incidents, as something “disgusting” and “unacceptable.” Fux’s contradictions were also legal. The minister condemned with similar foundations to more than six hundred inmates involved in the acts of January 8, 2023 for the same crimes imputed to Jair Bolsonaro.
However, Fux did voted to condemn for attempted abolition of the democratic State and the right to Walter Braga Netto (former Minister of the Civil House) and Mauro Cid (main assistant of orders of the former president), who has collaborated with the police throughout the process to reduce his penalty. “Condeming whoever fulfills Bolsonaro’s orders and acquitting who gives the orders has no logic. It is an absurd legal malformation,” says Salabert, deputy of the Democratic Democratic Party (PDT), in a telephone interview with Eldary. “The positive side of that vote (against Cid and Braga Netto) is that it makes it clear that there was an attempted coup in Brazil,” Salabert clarifies.
Marcelo Crespo, Coordinator of the Law Course of the Espm University of São Paulo, believes that the turn pocketist Luiz Fux has no legal explanation. “His change can only be understood as a political key. He made a triple deadly jump,” Crespo said to the newspaper State of São Paulo. Some political analysts interpret Fux vote as the seed to be a minister of justice in the future government of Tarcísio de Freitas, the most likely candidate of the extreme Brazilian right in the 2026 elections.
Minister Carmen Lúzia, the only woman in the Supreme Court, emphasized at the beginning of her speech the exceptionality of the budding day. “This criminal action is almost a Brazil meeting with its past, with its present and with its future,” he said. In turn, the minister stressed that from 2021 “new anti -democratic practices” began to threaten Brazil, as pointed out by the prosecutor’s accusation against former president Jair Bolsonaro and his followers.
Judge Flávio Dino, questioned by Carmen Lúzia, said that the 1964 military coup had less evidence than the Supreme has judged. For his part, Alexandre de Moraes intervened to emphasize that threats against democratic institutions and concrete threats of former president Bolsonaro against the Supreme cannot be considered freedom of expression.
After a very hard criticism of the anti -democratic acts of January 8, 2023 (“they were not a banal event”), against what he called “the machine of the coup” and to ensure that the supreme is the appropriate instance for a trial against the attempted attempt, Carmen Lúzia voted in favor of the conviction of the eight defendants.
Subsequently, Christian Minister Zanín began his argument ensuring that the Supreme Court is the appropriate instance to judge the coup plot, in clear allusion to Luiz Fux. He then made a thorough description of the threats to democracy perpetrated by the defendants. Zanín said that Jair Bolsonaro, with the help of the rest of the convicted, set up a criminal organization with the aim of staying in power after his electoral defeat. In addition, he said that the trial against the coup plot “will pacify the country.” Cristiano Zanín voted in favor of the conviction of all the defendants in all positions. The final result was left with four votes in favor of the conviction and one against.
Next steps
The number of years of the sentence of each of those convicted in the trial will be calculated by making an average of the requests of the Supreme magistrates who voted in favor. Alexandre de Moraes will define the place where Jair Bolsonaro will serve his sentence. Everything indicates that the former resident will enter Papuda’s penitentiary complex, a maximum security region of Brasilia. According to nearby allies, Bolsonaro is panicked to enter this prison and considers humiliation to enter a common prison, instead of a military, he revealed Folha de São Paulo.
The defense of Jair Bolsonaro, who received a breath of hope after the vote of Luiz Fux, has already anticipated that he will ask for his house prison, due to health reasons. After the so -called “chord” of the conviction (final text), the defense can present different resources, although nothing guarantees that they are accepted. Subsequently, “Declaration embargoes” can be requested, in case of divergence in the penalty proposed by different ministers or in the event that the defense considers impressions, contradictions or omission in the sentence. The review of the sentence is quite unlikely.
Jair Bolsonaro, who is already serving house imprisonment due to the obstruction of the justice and risk of escape from the country, could enter prison before the end of 2025.
Source: www.eldiario.es
