Understand the complaint against Eduardo Paes, accused in the Electoral Court for corruption | Rio de Janeiro

According to the complaint of the Electoral Public Ministry, accepted by the Electoral Justice, Paes received R $ 10.8 million of undue advantages, via box two, for his re-election campaign to the Rio City Council in 2012.

• Eduardo Paes, former mayor of Rio and candidate in 2020
• Pedro Paulo, former head of the Civil House of Rio, now a federal deputy (DEM-RJ)
• Leandro Azevedo, former Odebrecht executive
• Benedicto Barbosa da Silva Junior, former Odebrecht executive
• Renato Barbosa Rodrigues Pereira, Paes marketer at that time
• Eduardo Bandeira Villela, Renato’s partner

• Paes informed his campaign communication manager for the 2012 reelection, Renato Pereira, that Odebrecht would finance the campaign through box two;
• payments were made in 18 cash installments;
• Pedro Paulo, then Chief of Staff and political godson of Paes, instructed Odebrecht to make the payment;
• Benedicto Barbosa Junior and Leandro Azevedo, Odebrecht executives, made payments to Renato Pereira and Eduardo Bandeira Vilella, Prole partners;
• Offspring is the company that ran the Paes campaign;
• Odebrecht’s “bribery department” has records of payments in spreadsheets.

The accusation is based on award-winning statements, such as those of Benedicto Barbosa, head of the “bribery sector at Odebrecht”, and Renato Pereira, marketer of the Paes campaign. In his statement, Benedicto Barbosa affirms that there were two boxes.

However, he denies that Paes asked for bribes for personal use: “He never asked me for anything,” he told the Federal Public Ministry.

The executive also stated that the company did not receive anything in return, as consideration for paying two in cash.

“For me (Eduardo Paes did not give) any (benefit to Odebrecht). I am sure that Leandro, who was with me in the technical meetings, did not either.”

According to the deputy, Paes “illegitimately exercised decision-making power” over large engineering works to “direct the contracting in favor of contractors with whom it had a mutually beneficial relationship.”

The lawyers claim that the two cash payment provided advantages to the company, for example:

• The Odebrecht executive scheduled a meeting with Paes about Engenhão, the day after he requested the meeting by email;
• Paes helped release overdue amounts from the Transoeste project, after meeting with an Odebrecht executive.

The Electoral MP also presents statements from five former employees of the cash transport company Trans-Expert and those received for alleged amounts delivered to advertisers by Odebrecht.

Trans-Expert was the company responsible for the payments determined by Odebrecht’s “Registration Department”.

• passive corruption, for advising the marketer of his campaign Renato Pereira to receive two cash values;
• electoral ideological falsehood, for not declaring the total amount received for the 2012 campaign;
• money laundering, simulating the money paid to the advertising agency of the marketer Renato Pereira.

A The acceptance of the complaint by the Electoral Justice does not prevent Paes from running for the City Council of Rio in this year’s elections: last week the candidacy of the former mayor was made official. To be ineligible, a person must be sentenced in the second instance.

The marketer Renato Pereira says that Paes asked Odebrecht about R $ 25 million in cash in 2012 and that the former mayor said that the funds “would not go through the official account of the campaign.”

The complaint is based on records from the Odebrecht payment system, which attribute the payment to “Nervosinho,” the codename of the former mayor in the whistleblower version.

Another complaint that appears in the complaint is that of the former Secretary of Works, Alexandre Pinto. Three days before the 2018 elections, in which Paes was a candidate for state government, Pinto said the former mayor asked for 1.75% bribes for Transoeste’s work.

The project was valued at R $ 600 million and was executed by Odebrecht. The information was not confirmed by company executives.

Research history

The investigations into the payment of undue advantages at the request of Paes were initiated based on the complaint by Odebrecht executives in an open investigation in the Federal Supreme Court (STF).

In March 2019, the STF itself determined that the cases related to box two should be sent to the Electoral Justice, which also happened in this case.

With Odebrecht’s interest in works for the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympic Games, the company would have paid Paes more than R $ 15 million in box two. In addition to the investigation revealed on Tuesday (8), Paes also received R $ 5 million abroad in that campaign.

The Public Ministry, however, did not focus on this transfer, considering that there was no evidence that the R $ 5 million deposited abroad “had been effectively reversed to finance Eduardo Paes’ campaign to the City Council in 2012”.

In a letter presented to the Supreme Court in 2020, the Attorney General of the Municipality of Rio claims to have found “indicative elements that values ​​were diverted from the public coffers of the Municipality.”

What Benedicto Barbosa Júnior said

TV Globo obtained videos of the former executive’s complaint. In one section he is asked about the payment of undue advantages to the former mayor of Rio.

Federal Attorney: Did Eduardo Paes give Odebrecht any benefit?

Benedicto Barbosa Júnior: No no no. Through me, none. I am sure that Leandro, who accompanied me to technical meetings, did not either. The benefit was that we were able to participate in the tenders and since the tenders were, in a way, complex, we were able to study, spend some money in advance and then make the contracting feasible and be the company that was going to invest in that business so that the city ​​does not love money alone.

Federal Attorney: And you Eduardo Paes had some personal benefit with these donations?

Benedicto Barbosa Júnior: He never asked me for anything, in tenders, in business... Even because of his very imposing style, with the nickname of Nervosinho, he had no atmosphere … he did not generate an atmosphere that would provide any exchange, nothing … He was very dry, quite … he was not a loving person to have personal relationships outside of the environment in which he was being treated. So you never asked me for anything.

In note, the defense of the former mayor Eduardo Paes He said the house search “was a clear attempt to interfere with the electoral process.”

“On the eve of the elections for the Mayor of Rio, Eduardo Paes is outraged to have been the subject of a search and seizure action in a clear attempt to interfere in the electoral process, as he did in 2018 in the state government elections . “, said.

“The defense did not even have access to the terms of the complaint and as soon as it has details of the process, it will pronounce itself,” he amended.

Pedro Paulo he pointed out “the political use of the instruments of justice to interfere in the elections.”

“They will not intimidate us. When I access the content of the complaint, I will make my defense in the process,” he said.

You notice me Odebrecht said that it has collaborated with the authorities since 2016. The company also states that “it has entered into agreements in Brazil with the MPF, AGU, CGU and CADE, and abroad with the United States Department of Justice, the World Bank and the IDB. , in addition to institutions from more than six countries “. Also according to the company, “it is Lava Jato’s broadest, most complete and consistent collaboration process, carried out by 77 former executives and with complaints against more than 600 public agents. Odebrecht has been transformed and today has strict internal controls that reinforce its commitment to ethics, integrity and transparency ”.

HE G1 attempted to contact the other defendant.

GloboNews commentators analyze the complaint: