The lawsuit stems from Operation Bullish, which found the bank’s alleged favoring of Joesley Batista’s company
The 12th Federal Criminal Court of Brasilia acquitted former minister Guido Mantega, his son, Leonardo Vilardo Mantega, and former president of BNDES (National Bank for Economic and Social Development) Luciano Galvão Coutinho in the process that investigates the institution’s alleged favoring of the J&F group, owned by businessman Joesley Batista.
The 3 were indicted by the PF (Federal Police) in 2018 as a result of Operation Bullish, which investigated an alleged leak of R$ 1 billion between 2007 and 2011 in public coffers. Here’s the full of the decision (167 KB).
Guido Mantega was accused of fraudulent management, and his son of passive corruption and money laundering.
In the decision, Judge Marcus Vinícius stated that there is no evidence against the accused and that the MPF (Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office) sustains the accusation only with the declarations of Joesley Batista, given in a plea bargain.
In a note (read the full text at the end of the article), the defense of Mantega and his son said that the “decision was correct”.
According to the MPF complaint, the frauds would have occurred in 2007 and 2011. At the time, Mantega was Minister of Finance and Coutinho president of the BNDES.
So, Coutinho would have expanded the scheme in the state bank and would have accepted to receive investments without any kind of analysis. Leonardo, Mantega’s son, allegedly used a company to receive bribes.
Read the note released by the lawyer Fabio Tofic Simantob responsible for Mantega’s defense:
“The decision was very correct and expected from the Federal Judge, who not only recognized that Joesley Batista’s denunciation was worthless, but also completely removed the unreasonable suspicions surrounding the BNDES’ improper performance, also attesting to the regularity of the conduct attributed to Guido Mantega to the ahead of that institution and the Ministry of Finance.
“The decision also repaired the enormous injustice done to Leonardo Mantega, recognizing the legality of the investment made in the company where he worked and which had no connection with his father’s public service.”
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