Brazilian police accused Bolsonaro of falsifying his Covid vaccination certificate and asked to prosecute him

2024-03-20 00:40:00

The Brazilian police recommended prosecuting Jair Bolsonaro for falsifying vaccination certificates against Covid-19including his and his daughter’s, in a case that increases judicial pressure against the former president who always minimized the pandemic and publicly acknowledged that he was not vaccinated.

Bolsonaro and 16 other people were implicated in a scheme to broadcast “ideologically false certificates, with the intention of obtaining undue advantages related to the flouting of health measures” during the pandemic, according to the Federal Police document published on Tuesday.

Police target crimes “criminal association” e “insertion of false data into the public system”, both subject to prison sentences. The Attorney General’s Office now has a period of 15 days to comment on the recommendations of the investigation.

Bolsonaro is the subject of several investigations, including one for participating in a coup plot after being defeated by Lula

Fabio WajngartenBolsonaro’s lawyer, described “absurdities“The allegations: “While he served as president, he was completely exempt from presenting any type of certificate on his trips. This is one political persecution and an attempt to weigh down Bolsonaro’s enormous political capital”the lawyer wrote on the social network X.

The former president had testified before the Federal Police in Brasilia last May about this case. His house was raided as part of the investigations. In that appearance, denied the accusations and said authorities were trying to “build a case” against him.

“I received an order from the former president”: those involved in falsification and Bolsonaro’s causes

The police maintain that, at Bolsonaro’s request, Mauro Cid, his close collaborator at the time, introduced false information into the system. “I received an order from the former president of the RepublicJair Bolsonaro, to make the insertions of false data on behalf of himself and his daughter Laura Bolsonaro, those certificates were printed and I delivered them into the hands of the president,” Cid said, according to an excerpt of his police statement included in the report.

Cid, Bolsonaro’s former aide-de-camp and considered his right-hand man during the presidency, was preventively detained in May 2023 on suspicion of “initiating” the illegal practice. Other Bolsonaro subordinates, a doctor and several health officials, a lawyer and other soldiers also participated in the plot., according to the police. Cid was released months later after a successful plea agreement.

During the coronavirus pandemic, which left more than 700,000 dead in Brazil, then-President Bolsonaro (2019-2022) repeatedly questioned the effectiveness and convenience of vaccines. The far right He even joked that those who were immunized could become “crocodiles.”

Bolsonaro, in the oven: former military leaders declared that he brought them together to plan a coup against Lula

The former president was entered in Brazil’s health records as if he had received two doses of the vaccine, in August and October 2022. Defeated in the October presidential elections, Bolsonaro traveled to the United States on December 30, 2022, two days before the inauguration of leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

After a parallel investigation, The Brazilian Comptroller’s Office determined last January that Bolsonaro’s vaccination certificate was “false”, after finding inconsistencies between records from the Ministry of Health and other official entities. This investigation sought to determine whether federal officials were involved in the falsification. Nevertheless, They recommended filing the case “due to lack of minimum elements regarding the authorship of the events”.

In addition to the issue of fake certificates, Bolsonaro is the subject of several investigations, including one for participating in an alleged coup plot after being defeated in the elections by Lula.. Meanwhile, the Superior Electoral Court has already ruled against him by disqualifying him from running for elected office for eight years, for misinforming about the voting system.

ML