Court orders political marketer under pre-charge remand
João Santana and his wife Mônica Santana
Federal Judge Sérgio Moro ordered marketer João Santana and his wife Mônica Santana under pre-charge remand Thursday (March 3). The couple had been under temporary detention at a Federal Police building in Curitiba since last week, when they were arrested as part of the Operation Car Wash spin-off “Acarajé” crackdown.
In his ruling, Judge Moro said the detention order is designed to ensure smooth investigations—Santana is accused of trying to destroy data files. “[Santana's] conduct shows his liberty poses risks to the investigation and evidence gathering,” he said.
According to Federal Police, spreadsheets suggest the marketer was paid $270,000 by Odebrecht construction company in Brazil in connection with the Petrobras corruption scheme.
Police also say João Santana deleted his Dropbox cloud storage account the day the operation was launched. “In today's terms, deleting cloud files is equivalent to eliminating records that may be relevant to the investigation,” said Judge Sérgio Moro. Santana and his wife turned themselves in to Federal Police on February 23, on arrival from the Dominican Republic, where João Santana was coordinating a presidential campaign.
According to Santana's counsel, the Federal Police's evidence-tampering suspicions “are mere speculation like all the others. But this time they are so shallow that they do not even make sense. If it is true that the petitioners [the accused] knew of the operation beforehand, why on Earth would João Santana delete his Dropbox account right on the same day the crackdowns took place, not before?” the lawyers argued.
Translated by Mayra Borges
Fonte: Court orders political marketer under pre-charge remand
