[ad_1]
José Veiga transferred 30 thousand euros to the account of the defendant Bernardo Santos Martins, one of the supposed iron fronts of Rui Rangel.
Judge Rui Rangel asked the former president of the Lisbon Court of Appeals, Vaz das Neves, that an appeal from the businessman linked to Benfica José Veiga be manually distributed to Rui Gonçalves, according to the prosecutor in the Operation Lex case.
In the prosecutor’s order, with about a thousand pages and to which the Lusa agency had access, on January 7, 2013 Rui Rangel contacted the president of the Lisbon Court of Appeals (TRL), the defendant Vaz das Neves , alerting him to the number of the resource / process (of José Veiga) in which he, Rui Rangel, was interested.
This is so, according to the Public Ministry (MP), Vaz das Neves removed the process from the automatic distribution lists and handed it over to Judge Rui Gonçalves as agreed.
Rui Rangel is accused of passive corruption by illicit act, abuse of power, improper reception of advantages, usurpation of functions, tax fraud and falsification of documents, Luís Vaz das Neves is accused of passive corruption by illicit act and abuse of power and the businessman Veiga footballer from active corruption to illicit act.
The Prosecutor’s Office understands that, by ordering manual distribution, Vaz das Neves violated and disrespected the principle of the natural judge and the duties of exemption and impartiality, in collusion with Rui Rangel and José Veiga.
Similar conduct was attributed to Vaz das Neves in other cases, including a civil action in which Rui Rangel was a party and in the process of seizing assets of businessman Álvaro Sobrinho that were distributed to Rui Rangel himself.
A few days later, José Veiga transferred 30 thousand euros to the account of the accused Bernardo Santos Martins, one of Rui Rangel’s supposed iron fronts.
In July 2013, the rapporteur Rui Gonçalves fully accepted José Veiga’s appeal, acquitting him of the crimes of tax fraud and money laundering of which he is charged in the first instance.
Days later, again through the company International Services Congo SARL, the former manager of Benfica made another transfer of 50 thousand euros to the account of Bernardo Santos Martins, who is accused of tax fraud, money laundering, and eight days later another transfer of 54 thousand euros, followed by another of 51 thousand euros, among others.
According to the prosecution, the bank accounts of the lawyer Santos Martins and his son Bernardo served for several years to circulate the money of Rangel and other defendants in the process, including the judge and his wife Fátima Galante (they are separated without a formal divorce). ).
Between August 2012 and September 2013, the investigation revealed that Bernardo Santos Martins accounted for approximately 250 thousand euros from José Veiga International Services Congo SARL, and subsequently made several deposits in bank accounts of Rui Rangel, Fátima Galante, Joao Rangel and Rita Figueira, then girlfriend of the magistrate.
The MP alleges that Santos Martins and his son Bernardo were “intermediaries and instrumentalized by Rui Rangel” to receive large sums of money in their bank accounts and to carry out bank transfers, cash withdrawals and subsequent deposits that the judge used to pay their debts. expenses and people close to you.
The prosecution also maintains that the TRL bailiff and the defendant Octávio Correia were aware of the actions carried out by José Veiga with Rui Rangel, namely, the addiction to the distribution of cases.
In “Operation Lex”, there are crimes of passive and active corruption by illicit act, improper reception of an advantage, abuse of power, usurpation of functions, falsification of documents, tax fraud and money laundering.
To guarantee the payment of the advantages obtained by the defendants, for an amount greater than 1.5 million euros, the seizure of the defendants’ assets was required.
[ad_2]
