The Federal Supreme Court (STF) published on Friday (11) the decision of the first class that made former President Jair Bolsonaro and seven allies defendants for planning and trying a failed coup. 
Bolsonaro has not yet spoken about the judgment. According to a liberal party note (PL), the former president was ill at dawn and is hospitalized in a hospital in Natal, Rio Grande Norte, where he was taken after “severe abdominal pain due to the stab sized in 2018”.
With about 500 pages, the judgment – a single decision issued by a group of judges – summarizes the Judgment held on March 26when the five ministers of the first class unanimously accepted the complaint filed by the Attorney General, Paulo Gonet.
The publication of the document is an indispensable step towards the continuity of the case, as it marks the written formalization of what was judged. As a result, defenses can be notified and have the opportunity to file questions to what was registered by the judgment. The most common deadline is five days from the notification.
If any defense questions or contests the content of the judgment, Minister-Report Alexandre de Moraes must request an opinion from the PGR, before deciding whether or not to accept these appeals. He can decide monocratically (individually) or send questions for deliberation of the first class.
Only after these procedures that the criminal action on the case effectively proceeds in the Supreme, with the opening of a new phase of procedural instruction, in which defense and accusation may inquire witnesses, request the production of more evidence and build their allegations based on evidence.
All of these steps are defined by the Code of Criminal Procedure, which ensures, for example, that defendants’ defenses manifest only after any whistleblowers in the same action. This right was not conferred by the first class to those investigated in the stages prior to receiving the complaint, but must be applied from now on, as ensured by the ministers during the March trial.
Only after all the instructional stage has been overcome – whose pace of advance depends, for example, on the amount of petitions that will be presented by defense and accusation – that any judgment of merit must be marked, and the first class should vote whether to acquit or condemns the eight defendants.
The ministers who make up the first class and are responsible for the decisions in the case of São Alexandre de Moraes, Cristiano Zanin, Flávio Dino, Luiz Fux and Cármen Lúcia.
Until the judgment of merit, the rule is for the defendants to respond to the criminal action in freedom. Any arrest to serve a sentence may only occur after the final judgment of the case, ie, when there is no further appeal.
It is possible to determine the pre -trial detention before the conviction of any of the defendants, but this can be done only if different criteria provided for by criminal law are met. Among the factors considered are the risk to the action, the risk of escape and the threat to public order.
This is the case of General Walter Braga Netto, former minister of the Civil House and vice in the Bolsonaro plate in 2022. He has been arrested since December at an army facility after being charged by the Federal Police (PF) of trying to obstruct investigations.
Understand
In all, PGR denounced 34 people for involvement in the coup plot. All were accused by the same five crimes: armed criminal organization, attempted coup d’état, attempted to abolish the Democratic Rule of Law, deterioration of public assets and damage qualified by the use of violence and serious threat. Added, the penalties exceed 30 years in jail.
According to the complaint, the planning and execution of the frustrated coup attempt began in mid -2021, with deliberate attacks on the electronic ballot boxes and the electoral system, and ended on January 8, 2023, when Bolsonaro supporters invaded and deprecated the headquarters of the three powers in Brasilia.
Claiming to want to give greater organization and speed to the case, the Attorney General, Paulo Gonet, said the complaint in five nuclei, so that each of these nuclei is judged in his own criminal action. This kind of slicing was confirmed by the first class, based on the jurisprudence of the Supreme.
On March 26, the first class judged the main core of the complaint, consisting of Bolsonaro, former state ministers, presidential advisors and military. The complaint was unanimously accepted in relation to all. It was the first time a former president became a defendant in the Supreme for crimes against the democratic order.
The eight defendants of the so -called “crucial core” of the coup are:
- Jair Bolsonaro, former President of the Republic;
- Walter Braga Netto, Army General, former Minister and Vice of Bolsonaro on the 2022 election plate;
- General Augusto Heleno, former Minister of the Institutional Security Office;
- Alexandre Ramagem, former director of the Brazilian Intelligence Agency – ABIN;
- Anderson Torres, former Justice Minister and former Security Secretary of the Federal District;
- Almir Garnier, former Navy Commander;
- Paulo Sérgio Nogueira, Army General and former Defense Minister;
- Mauro Cid, whistleblower and former joint of Bolsonaro’s orders.
>> Find out what was the participation of the 34 reported in an attempt to coup
Defense
The defendants of the accused denied, one by one, the authorship of the crimes by their customers. Most lawyers also complained about procedural matters, claiming, for example, the defense curtailmentbecause they did not have access, they say, to the gross material that supported the complaint.
After the trial, lawyer Celso Vilardi, who represents Bolsonaro, said he hoped that, with the opening of the criminal action, the broader access to the material used by the accusation will be given. “We hope we will now have a fullness of defense, which we have not had so far,” said the defender.
