By Ricardo Brito
BRASILIA (Reuters) -Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro allegedly helped orchestrate an illegal surveillance scheme by intelligence agency ABIN to target his political enemies during his term, a federal police report showed on Wednesday.
The report, which was released by the Supreme Court, said the group used ABIN to spy on and attack political foes and state institutions and to disseminate fake news.
The findings, based on testimony, documents from search operations and other evidence, identified Bolsonaro as the “main beneficiary” from the surveillance.
Bolsonaro’s lawyer, Celso Vilardi, said he had not yet reviewed the police report and could not comment.
Despite implicating Bolsonaro, police did not formally accuse him in the report, which did accuse more than 30 other individuals.
Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes said he made the findings public after leaks led to conflicting media reports on the matter on Tuesday.
Police noted potential links between the ABIN probe and an investigation into an alleged coup attempt, in which Bolsonaro is already a defendant.
The decision on whether to charge Bolsonaro in the surveillance case has been left to Brazil’s Prosecutor General’s Office.
Among those formally accused was Carlos Bolsonaro, the former president’s son and a Rio de Janeiro city councilor, who police alleged was part of the criminal organization.
The younger Bolsonaro has denied wrongdoing, stating on Tuesday that the investigation aimed to harm him ahead of next year’s elections.
Alexandre Ramagem, the former head of ABIN under Bolsonaro’s administration, and Luiz Fernando Correa, the current head of the agency, were also among the people formally accused by police, the report showed.
Ramagem was accused of being part of a criminal organization and using ABIN to illegal ends, while Correa is suspected of obstructing the police investigation into the agency, police said.
Ramagem could not be reached for comment on Wednesday, but said in a post on X on Tuesday that he would analyze the accusations once he had access to the police report.
ABIN did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday. It had declined to comment on Tuesday.
(Reporting by Ricardo Brito in Brasilia; Writing by Andre Romani; Editing by Kylie Madry and Leslie Adler)
Comments