[ad_1]
The Judicial Police have already found the Tancos material that had been hidden by João Paulino, the alleged leader of the assault on the national warehouses at dawn on June 28, 2017. It involves around 2,500 ammunition, grenades and explosives. The war material was hidden in a pine forest near Ansião (central area) where the aggressor resides, who is under house arrest.
It was on the morning of this Friday that João Paulino met with the inspectors of the Judicial Police to deliver the war material that had not yet been returned to the authorities, as he had promised last week. According to a source close to the process, João Paulino delivered more ammunition than what appears on the list of missing material.
Also this Friday, João Paulino was acquitted by the court in the case of the theft of 55 Glock pistols at the national leadership of the PSP. As he was in due diligence with the PJ, he could not attend the reading of the sentence in the trial that resulted in the conviction of former PSP gunsmith Luís Gaiba to nine years and eight months in prison.
Last week, the alleged leader of the assault on the Tancos warehouses had announced to the Santarém Court, where the Tancos trial will take place, that he intended to return the war material that had not been recovered by the authorities. The suspect claimed to be “available to deliver the rest of the material extracted from the national warehouses in Tancos, hoping that the Judicial Police will contact him to expedite its delivery.”
According to the Santarém court order, the defendant’s purpose “is related to the fact that he intends to collaborate with justice.” The latter “also intends to benefit from the legal extensions derived from his conduct, while showing a cooperative attitude with the authorities.” That is, have a reduced sentence.
The list of material that was not returned in October 2017, four months after the Tancos assault, included 1,450 9mm rounds, a decompression trigger, two tear gas grenades, one offensive grenade, two offensive cutting grenades for instruction, 20 CCD20 linear shear loads and 15 CCD30 linear shear loads.
The Tancos case has 23 defendants, divided between those who participated in the assault on the national warehouses in Tancos in the early morning of June 28, 2017 (nine suspects) and those who were involved in the illegal weapons recovery operation, which was placed in a wasteland. Scorched in October of that year (fourteen defendants).
Former Defense Minister Azeredo Lopes, together with Colonel Luís Vieira, former director of the Military Judicial Police, the former spokesman of that police, Vasco Brazão, as well as the soldiers of the GNR are suspected of being involved in the cover-up operation to recover the stolen weapons. Already Former marine João Paulino assumed during the training phase that he participated in the assault on the national warehouses.
In April, the former marine had taken over from Judge Carlos Alexandre, who was part of the assault and denied that he was just an informant from the GNR or the Military Judicial Police (PJM). Then he assured that when he signed an agreement with the two GNR soldiers in Loulé to hand over their weapons in exchange for not being held criminally responsible, they all had the perfect notion that they were negotiating with one of the assailants and not with someone outside the assault.
In January, Paulino was released from excessive pre-trial detention. He was complying with the most severe measure of coercion, pretrial detention, since September 28, 2018, when he was detained by the Judicial Police in the framework of Operation Húbris. The release was due to the fact that the preventive period had ended, at a time when the case was in the investigation stage. To date, an investigative decision would have been required for Paulino to remain in detention.
Tancos’ trial begins on November 2 in the Santarém court.
