The national justice inspector, Minister Luis Felipe Salomão, opened an investigation into the conduct of Judge Gabriela Hardt, former substitute for the 13th Federal Court of Curitiba, the basis of Operation Lava Jato. The investigation was opened in the wake of a disciplinary complaint by businessman Tony Garcia, who attributes alleged ‘bias’ and ‘retaliations’ to the judge.
“Considering the context presented and in view of the fine line that separates simply jurisdictional acts from those that have correctional relevance, as well as the peculiar caution affecting the performance of the National Justice Department, the investigation of the facts is salutary”, he noted.
In an order signed this Monday, the 17th, Salomão gave Gabriela 15 days to provide information about Tony Garcia’s allegations. Recently, the businessman claimed to have acted as a ‘collaborator infiltrated in the political and business environment by award-winning collaboration agreement’ for two years, when Lava Jato was commanded by former judge Sérgio Moro.
Salomão decided to investigate the conduct of Gabriela, who acted as a substitute for three former holders of the 13th Federal Court of Curitiba – Sérgio Moro, Luís Antônio Bonat and Eduardo Appio – after Tony Garcia claimed that the magistrate ‘was aware of potentially criminal facts practiced’ by Moro and prosecutors of the extinct Lava Jato task force, ‘but remained inert’. He also maintained that there were ‘retaliations’ by the magistrate after she became aware of the ‘criminal facts.
The Lava Jato investigator argued ‘violation of the principle of impersonality’ due to the magistrate, allegedly having conducted with unusual speed the process he is targeting in Lava Jato. For Tony Garcia, such behavior “denotes that the judge would be interested in conducting the deeds” that involve him.
The same allegations had already been raised by Tony’s defense in the case file pending at the 13th Federal Court of Curitiba. The lawyers maintained that the magistrate’s impartiality would be compromised to analyze the case against the businessman. The judge then declared herself a suspect to review the case.
At the time, the defense maintained that Gabriela would have ‘changed her posture in conducting the deeds’ to ‘retaliate’ Tony Garcia due to the whistleblower’s accusations against the senator and former judge Sérgio Moro, who was head of the 13th Court at the height of Lava Jato.
Tony’s lawyers recall that, after assuming Lava Jato’s deeds, Judge Eduardo Appio forwarded copies of the businessman’s process to the Federal Supreme Court due to a statement by the whistleblower, in March 2021, in which he claimed ‘to have “worked” for more than two years as a ‘collaborator infiltrated in the political and business environment under a rewarded collaboration agreement’.
Appio sent the allegations to the STF in the context of the petition that deals with the accusations of the lawyer Rodrigo Tacla Duran to the architects of Lava Jato – Moro and the impeached deputy Deltan Dallagnol. In the document, the judge highlighted that Tony Garcia reported having acted as an ‘infiltrator’ ‘reporting accounts to prosecutors of the Republic and to the then judge Sérgio Moro’.
#Corregidor #opens #investigation #Gabriela #Hardt #retaliation #whistleblower