2024-01-30 00:56:15
The pressure on the entourage of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro increased on Monday, with searches at the home of one of his sons as part of the investigation into suspicions of illegal spying on political adversaries during its mandate.
New searches were carried out as a continuation of an operation that took place on Thursday, with the aim of investigating a criminal organization within the Brazilian Intelligence Agency [ABIN]said the federal police (PF) in a press release.
According to the judicial ruling which authorized the searches on Monday in several Brazilian states, one of the targets of these searches was Carlos Bolsonaro, municipal councilor of Rio de Janeiro and second of the four sons of the far-right ex-president .
Investigators suspect ABIN of having used Israeli spyware called FirstMile to spy on hundreds of politicians and public figures during the Bolsonaro presidency (2019-2022).
The PF explained in its statement that this new stage of the operation launched on Thursday targeted the political core to identify the main recipients and beneficiaries of information illegally produced by ABIN through clandestine acts.
The judicial ruling, signed by Supreme Court judge Alexandre de Moraes, notably mentions a request for information from the ABIN on investigations involving the president [Bolsonaro] and three of his sons.
A request made, according to investigators, in February 2020 by an assistant of Carlos Bolsonaro to a collaborator of Alexandre Ramagem, then head of the intelligence agency, during an exchange of messages on WhatsApp reproduced in the court document.
One of my sons would never have made such a request, and even if it had been the case, it would have been rejected by Mr. Ramagem, declared Jair Bolsonaro on Monday, during an interview with the CNN Brasil channel a few hours after the searches. According to him, his son Carlos will be interviewed by the police on Tuesday.
I have never received any information about anyone’s whereabouts. I never requested or obtained any report from ABIN, insisted the former president, saying he was a victim of persecution.
The former head of ABIN, who is now a federal deputy in Mr. Bolsonaro’s Liberal Party, was the target of one of the 21 searches carried out Thursday in the context of this same affair.
On Monday, police visited nine addresses in total, in the states of Rio de Janeiro (southeast), Goias (central-west) and Bahia (northeast), as well as in the federal district of Brasilia .
Carlos Bolsonaro’s home in Rio de Janeiro and his office in the municipal assembly were searched.
Police also went to a residence where Jair Bolsonaro and his first three sons were in Angra dos Reis, a seaside town located about 150 km from Rio.
The third son of the ex-president, deputy Eduardo Bolsonaro, condemned the excesses committed according to him during the searches, denouncing an illegal legal action in addition to being immoral.
He also denied rumors that the Bolsonaro clan had fled by boat after learning of the searches.
As soon as they knew that the PF was in the residence, Jair and Carlos returned home, he assured.
One of the Bolsonaro family’s lawyers indicated on X that they had embarked at dawn for a fishing trip.
Images from GloboNews television showed police officers leaving the Angra dos Reis house as Jair Bolsonaro and his son Carlos looked on, filmed outside the front door.
The court document that gave the green light to the first searches cited Judge Moraes among those who had been spied on, as well as former President of the Chamber of Deputies Rodrigo Maia and Camilo Santana, governor of the northeastern state of Ceara. ) at the time and now Minister of Education under leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
Sentenced to eight years of ineligibility last year for disseminating false information on the electronic voting system, Jair Bolsonaro, 68, has been surrounded by business, notably for corruption, since he lost the presidential election at the end of 2022 against to Lula.
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