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Attorney Frederick Wassef, who has served for President Jair Bolsonaro (without a party) and one of his sons, Senator Flávio Bolsonaro (Republicans-RJ), said this afternoon that he never participated in any corruption scheme and that “he never responded to demand or was investigated “in 28 years of defense.
Wassef was denounced today by the Lava Jato working group in Rio de Janeiro on charges of money laundering and embezzlement, that is, embezzlement. The prosecution assures that R $ 4.6 million of public funds were diverted through false contracts for the provision of legal services. The complaint is a branch of the “Esquema S” operation, which investigates alleged fraud in entities of the Río S.
“I have and never had a commercial relationship with FECOMERCIO, I was not hired by them, I did not receive a penny from this entity and I never negotiated with them,” he said. “The legal services were duly rendered, the fees were declared to the Federal Treasury and the taxes paid,” he added. (Read the full statement below)
According to Wassef, all legal services “were duly rendered, the fees were declared to the Federal Income and the taxes paid.”
“The complaint from the Federal Public Ministry is inept and does not describe any conduct practiced by me or any crime,” he said. “Since the beginning of the aforementioned” scheme “operation, they have not investigated me and in the end they have not denounced me, because they always knew that I never participated in any scheme.”
Besides Wassef, four other people were denounced by the Federal Prosecutor’s Office: Orlando Diniz, former president of Fecomércio-RJ; the businessman Marcelo Cazzo; and the attorneys Luiza Nagib Eluf and Marcia Carina Castelo Branco Zampiron.
The group is accused of crimes committed by the diversion of R $ 4.6 million from the Rio de Janeiro sections of Sesc, Senac and Fecomércio. The lawyers allege that the deviations occurred from December 2016 to May 2017 under the pretext of providing legal services to Fecomércio-RJ.
Of that amount, R $ 2.68 million would have remained with Wassef, according to the complaint. The contract was signed with the office of Luiza Eluf, a lawyer and former prosecutor of the São Paulo Public Ministry.
However, the investigations indicated that the contractual scope was false, because either the services were not provided or were provided in the exclusive interest of Orlando Diniz for, for example, persecution of personal opponents, according to the MPF.
The new events are in addition to those that had already been denounced in a previous complaint of Operation “Scheme S”. “The already denounced members of the criminal organization used false contracts with the offices of the accused or third parties designated by them, in which the legal services indicated in the contracts were not provided, but paid high fees,” reported the MPF.
According to prosecutors, the amounts diverted were public. “The resources of Sescs and Senacs have public origin, since the IRS transfers payroll contributions from commercial companies so that they invest in the training and well-being of merchants,” describes the statement from the Public Ministry.
The bureau covered up Wassef’s hiring, says Diniz
Fecomércio’s contract with Luiza Eluf’s office provided for the service of “internal administrative consultations” in Fecomércio. It was signed in December 2016. The work would cost R $ 4.6 million, but the attorney general said that the office only served as “intermediary (sic) for Frederick Wassef’s remuneration.”
Orlando Diniz, former president of Fecomércio, said Wassef could not be hired directly because his then-partner, María Cristina Boner Leo, “had pending legal matters, which could attract unwanted sources of hiring,” prosecutors assessed. “They couldn’t hire me directly because his wife was
owner of an information technology company with problems in justice, “said the businessman, in testimony to the Lava Jato working group in Rio de Janeiro.
As revealed Twitter, a company linked to Cristina Boner, Globalweb Outsourcing, has already earned more than R $ 55 million under the government of Jair Bolsonaro (without a party). The company, the businesswoman and the lawyer deny political interference. The case is investigated by the Federal Court of Accounts (TCU).
Prosecutors claim that as soon as Fecomércio paid Luiza Eluf’s office, “most” of the funds were transferred to Wassef and Márcia Zampiron’s company.
According to the MPF, Márcia and her husband were the owners of a company called Corseque, he used to do the “personal monitoring” of a Fecomércio employee, named Daniele, who is suspected of leaking information. “ORLANDO DINIZ’s true intention when signing contracts with the company CORSEQUE and with the LUIZA ELUF office was
they criminalize the personal conduct of Daniele Paraíso, some of which are not even related to her status as a Sistema S employee, ”the complaint states.
An audit carried out in 2018 sought to reveal what work Luiz Eluf’s office did to justify the payments. But nothing was found. “LUIZA ELUF did not collect documents related to work carried out by me under his own name, or on behalf of FREDERICK WASSEF, MARCIA ZAMPIRON and their offices,” says the complaint.
For prosecutors, public funds sent to Fecomércio – which carries out professional training, among other activities – were subject to “diversion.”
Read the full statement
They are criminalizing the law in Brazil. I do not have and never had a commercial relationship with FECOMERCIO, I was not hired by them, I did not receive a penny from this entity and I never negotiated with them.
I was hired and provided legal services to a renowned criminal law firm in São Paulo, where the owner is a famous prosecutor from the São Paulo Public Ministry, known for having dedicated his entire life and career to the Public Ministry and the fight against crime. , in the case of a public person, with integrity, proof and undoubted suitability.
The legal services were duly rendered, the fees were declared to the Public Treasury and the taxes paid.
After two years of investigation by FECOMERCIO, I was never cited or cited by any authority to provide any clarification. Since the beginning of the aforementioned “scheme” operation, they have not investigated me and in the end they have not reported me, since they always knew that I never participated in any scheme.
Curiously, after the complaint of all the lawyers mentioned in the aforementioned operation, I submitted to a search and seizure in which nothing was apprehended because they did not find any irregularity and, curiously, they decided to offer a slight, isolated complaint, based on absolutely nothing against me.
The complaint of the Federal Public Ministry is inept and does not describe any conduct practiced by me or any crime, limiting itself simply to narrating payments of legal fees for services duly rendered, innovating in Brazil, transforming the ordinary exercise of the right into a crime, irresponsibly and without measuring the consequences of the damage to my image and reputation.
Never in my life have I responded to a lawsuit or been investigated, I have always had a clean name and not even in 28 years of advocacy have I had a single representation in my disagreement before the Brazilian Bar Association.
