Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the 35th and 39th president of Brazil, was imprisoned at the ABC Metalworkers' Union in São Bernardo do Campo, in Greater São Paulo following his surrender to the Federal Police of Brazil (PF) on 7 April 2018 until the Supreme Federal Court (STF) overturned the arrest 8 November 2019.
On 8 March 2021, Justice Edson Fachin overturned Lula's convictions related to Operation Car Wash, ruling that the Federal Regional Court of the 4th Region had tried the case outside its jurisdiction. More than a year later, on 28 April 2022, the United Nations Human Rights Committee published the conclusion of an analysis in which it pointed out that Sergio Moro had been biased in the trial of the cases against Lula.
Chronology
On 12 July 2017, Sergio Moro, then a federal judge of first instance, sentenced Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to nine years and six months in prison for passive corruption and money laundering in a criminal case involving a triplex apartment in Guarujá, on the coast of the state of São Paulo. In the second instance, the sentence was increased to 12 years and one month, after a unanimous vote. Then, on April 5, Moro issued the arrest warrant. In April 2019, in a unanimous decision, the 5th Panel of the Superior Court of Justice (STJ) upheld Lula's conviction and reduced the sentence for passive corruption and money laundering from 12 years and one month to eight years and ten months in prison. The triplex case was investigated as part of Operation Car Wash. Lula served his sentence in Curitiba, capital of Paraná, in the building of the Regional Superintendency of the Federal Police in Paraná. In August 2018, the United Nations Human Rights Committee requested that Brazil guarantee Lula the right to exercise his political rights while in prison, including access to members of his party and the media and participation in the 2018 presidential election in Brazil. The Brazilian Foreign Ministry questioned the Committee and referred the decision to the Judiciary.
On 8 March 2021, Justice Edson Fachin overturned Lula's convictions related to Operation Car Wash, ruling that the Federal Regional Court of the 4th Region had tried the case outside its jurisdiction, based on a previous decision by the Second Panel of the Supreme Federal Court (STF) in the case of Transpetro, a Brazilian company linked to Petrobras, responsible for fuel transportation and logistics, which operates in the import and export of oil and oil products, gas, and ethanol. It was determined that the case should be tried in Brasília. As a result, Lula regained his political rights and the legal proceedings against him were transferred to the Federal Regional Court of the 1st Region. Subsequently, the Guarujá triplex case, which led to Lula's imprisonment, was dismissed by the court.
On 28 April 2022, the United Nations Human Rights Committee published the conclusion of an analysis in which it pointed out that Sergio Moro had been biased in the trial of the cases against Lula. According to the Committee's decision, Lula's political rights were violated in 2018 after he was prevented from participating in that year's presidential elections. The Committee determined that Brazil must present the measures adopted to repair the damage caused to the former president within 180 days and prevent other people from being targeted by similar proceedings in the future. Lula was the first former president of Brazil to be imprisoned for a conviction for a common crime. Before him, six other former presidents of the country were imprisoned: Hermes da Fonseca, Washington Luís, Artur Bernardes, Café Filho, Jânio Quadros, and Juscelino Kubitschek, all for explicit political reasons.
Overview
List of criminal cases involving Lula
The triplex case was one of several cases in which Lula was involved. Lula was a defendant in ten criminal cases in total, including some in which he has already been acquitted or convicted. Some of these criminal cases are part of Operation Car Wash.
Background
In March 2010, Rio de Janeiro newspaper O Globo published a report about an apartment in the city of Guarujá, in the state of São Paulo, that allegedly belonged to then-President Lula. There were no suspicions of illegality at the time; the report focused on a multiple year delay in constructing the apartment complex, and its construction being taken over by Construtora OAS.
Operation Car Wash
In March 2014, an anti-corruption probe nicknamed Operation Car Wash (Operação Lava Jato) began; it would become the largest anti-corruption operation in the history of Brazil, revealing corruption and illegal payments in procurements of public works, many related to Petrobras. Several companies – Odebrecht, Camargo Corrêa, Construtora OAS, among others – were accused of bribing Petrobras employees and higher-ups to only choose their companies for Petrobras procurements; the companies would then decide, among themselves, on an overpriced invoice and pocket the difference. Those bribes were initially made in cash, but would later take the form of offshore transfers or the paying off of properties.
The investigation expanded through plea deals, such that over 200 arrests and 1 thousand search and seizure operations were made, recovering over R$4 billion in total (over US$1 billion).
Societal context
Operation Car Wash coincided with an explosive growth in what was termed "antipetismo" (an "anti-Workers' Party" sentiment) around 2014. This was motivated in part by a dissatisfaction with the economy: during the latest few years of a Worker's Party government, the Brazilian real had been losing strength in the USD exchange. In March 2015, for example, it hit a decade-long high, at USD$1 = R$3.16.
Protests broke out throughout the country calling for then-president Dilma Rousseff's removal from office, be it through an impeachment or military intervention, as part of a movement called "Vem pra Rua" (lit. 'Come to the Streets'). An April 2015 poll of protestors put over 90%, a majority of which were middle- and upper-class White Brazilians, believing the Workers' Party did a "great harm" to Brazil; and 37% believing minorities such as Afro-Brazilians, women and homosexuals had "too many rights" in Brazil.
Lula involvement
In March 2016, Lula was the target of a coerced summons (condução coercitiva) to testify on suspicions of receiving bribes by Construtora OAS and Odebrecht in the form of renovations of an apartment in Guarujá and a country house in Atibaia, both in the state of São Paulo. Lula was also under investigation for money received as donations and payments for lectures.
At the time, Lula criticized the coercion aspect of the summons, stating he wouldn't have refused to testify if asked. He also stated that were Federal Police to find a single real of his came from embezzlement, he didn't deserve to be a part of the Workers' Party. Lula further criticized that his lawyers were not informed of "anything", while some in the news media had prior knowledge of the intricacies of the investigation: "it's regretful that a portion of the Brazilian Judiciary is working in association with the press".
Lula also justified what was seen as suspiciously high prices for his lectures: "People wanted Lula to speak on the things he did in Brazil. The miracle he did to approve Prouni, Fies, to bring energy to 15 million of the poor in this country. That's why I became the most expensive speaker in the world, alongside Bill Clinton. [...] I don't have a mongrel complex. I know what I did for the country".
Accusation
A few days after his summons, São Paulo state's Public Prosecutor's Office (MP-SP) formally accused Lula and his wife, Marisa Letícia, of money laundering and concealment of assets. According to the prosecutors, Lula was the de facto owner of the Guarujá apartment (even if it was legally still property of the Construtora OAS company), which they argued constituted money laundering.
Crucially, the São Paulo state courts sent the accusation papers to the federal courts in Curitiba, in the state of Paraná, to be ruled on by Sergio Moro. At the time, there was already an open Supreme Federal Court case asking its deliberation on whether the prosecution would fall under the federal or São Paulo state jurisdictions.
Adding to the complaints, in September 2016, the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office accused Lula and seven other people of corruption and money laundering. According to the federal prosecutors, Lula was the "supreme commander" of the corruption scheme revealed by Operation Car Wash involving three contracts between Construtora OAS and Petrobras; Lula had allegedly received almost R$4 million in bribes, paid not in money but through renovations of the Guarujá apartment and the storage of personal items. A few days later, judge Sergio Moro accepted the Prosecutor's Office complaint, and Lula officially became a defendant in Operation Car Wash.
After being charged, Lula gave a speech: "I respect the institutions and respect the laws. I'll testify as many times as they want. [...] When I infringe on the law, punish me to make me an example. But when I don't, find someone else to mess with". Lula also praised the Transparency Portal and the Lei de Acesso à Informação (lit. 'Information Access Law'), created during his and Dilma's governments; and stated: "Prove I've been corrupt and I'll surrender by foot".
By May 2017, Lula was accused of a further 10 corruption and 44 money laundering cases relating to renovations of a country house in Atibaia; though it was not owned by Lula, the prosecution argued the renovations were bribes in his benefit by the companies Odebrecht, Construtora OAS e Schahin.
Lula's lawyers filed a lawsuit against prosecutor Deltan Dallagnol, seeking compensation for moral damages for the press conference given by Dallagnol in 2016 in which he used a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation to explain the charges against Lula. Initially, Dallagnol was acquitted in the first and second instances, but when the case reached the Superior Court of Justice (STJ), the court ordered Dallagnol to pay Lula 146,000 reais in damages. The ministers of the fourth panel of the STJ considered that Deltan Dallagnol exceeded the limits of his duties as a prosecutor by using language that discredited Lula's honor and image at the press conference, in addition to using non-technical language. The STJ ministers also considered that Dallagnol attributed to Lula facts that were not included in the complaint in the triplex case, as explained during the press conference. The Supreme Federal Court upheld the STJ's ruling, ordering Dallagnol to pay damages to Lula.
Defense
In 2016, Lula's defense team submitted a request to the United Nations (UN) to assess possible violations in the legal proceedings involving Lula under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Brazil is a signatory. In May 2018, the organization's Human Rights Committee stated that it would not take a final position until 2019, but denied precautionary measures against the former president's imprisonment.
Testimonials
On 20 April 2017, former OAS president Léo Pinheiro testified before Judge Sergio Moro, saying that the triplex did indeed belong to Lula and that the apartment had never been put up for sale by OAS because it was reserved for the former president. He also said that Lula himself had approved the design of the triplex and the ranch in Atibaia, which was investigated in another case. Lula's defense claimed that Léo Pinheiro was lying in order to try to secure a plea bargain. About a year earlier, the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo reported that Léo Pinheiro had told another version of the story, in which he exonerated Lula, but prosecutors considered this version implausible.
On 10 May 2017, Lula gave his testimony to Judge Sergio Moro about the triplex case. During the interrogation, which lasted almost five hours, the former president denied owning the apartment and said he never intended to purchase it. Lula said he only visited the triplex once to see what it was like and did not want to buy it. He also said that his wife, Marisa Letícia Lula da Silva, was interested in the property and that she had tried to purchase the apartment without telling him about it. The testimony had a major impact in Brazil and in the international press. In Curitiba, where the testimony was given, protesters held demonstrations for and against the former president throughout the day.