Brazil’s ex-president and alleged head of a graft ring, Michel Temer, was freed from jail Monday after a judge said there were no legal grounds for his detention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Temer<\/a>, accused of leading a sophisticated embezzlement and money laundering scheme, was the second ex-president of the Latin American country to be caught up in a sprawling anti-corruption probe called Car Wash that has claimed scores of political and corporate scalps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The 78-year-old predecessor of the current far-right President Jair Bolsonaro<\/a>was arrested <\/a>Thursday in Sao Paulo and placed in “preventative detention” in Rio de Janeiro — a decision overturned by judge Antonio Ivan Athie, citing the lack of legal justification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Athie also ordered the immediate release of former mines and energy minister Moreira Franco and several others detained along with Temer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n “I am not against the so-called Car Wash (investigation),” Athie said in his decision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I want to see our country free from the corruption that plagues it. However, without constitutional guarantees, guaranteed to all … there is no legitimacy in the fight against this plague.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Despite evidence that could incriminate the accused, it “did not justify preventative detention”, Athie said, pointing to the absence of proof that the accused were a threat to public order or would hide evidence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hours after the ruling, Temer was freed and whisked away in a car.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The federal prosecutor’s office said it would appeal the decision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ‘Various crimes’<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The federal prosecutor’s office on Thursday accused Temer of leading a criminal organization that was “involved in concrete acts of clear gravity.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n It described a “sophisticated criminal system” which by the end of 2014 had made illicit payments of some one million reais (the equivalent of $500,000 at the time) in connection with the construction of a nuclear power plant that was never completed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Investigations suggest the group may have committed “various crimes” with public agencies and state-owned companies involving nearly half a billion dollars, the statement said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Since 2014 the Car Wash probe has uncovered a vast graft operation involving state oil firm Petrobras and major construction companies and bribes to politicians of several parties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n More than 150 people have been convicted and hundreds more charged so far. The scale of the corruption uncovered has stunned Brazilians weary of graft among their leaders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Temer is just the latest ex-president caught up in the probe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Former leftist president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva<\/a> is serving a lengthy jail term after being convicted in two corruption cases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Temer, who took over as a caretaker figure after the last Workers Party president, Dilma Rousseff, was impeached and removed from office in 2016, was Brazil’s most unpopular leader ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While Rousseff was not directly implicated in the Car Wash scandal, she was damaged by association, having chaired the board at Petrobras between 2003-2010, when much of the alleged corruption was flourishing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Temer, a center-right politician of the PMDB party, faced several corruption accusations on leaving office last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Brazil’s Congress voted to dismiss two allegations in 2017, cementing his reputation as the ultimate survivor in one of the world’s messiest and most scandal-ridden democracies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n https:\/\/www.france24.com\/en\/20190326-brazil-ex-president-michel-temer-released-jail<\/a> Brazil’s ex-president and alleged head of a graft ring, Michel Temer, was freed from jail Monday after a judge said there were no legal grounds for his detention. Temer, accused of leading a sophisticated embezzlement and money laundering scheme, was the second ex-president of the Latin American country to be caught up in a sprawling anti-corruption probe called Car Wash… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":123,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/123"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3561"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3561\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3568,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3561\/revisions\/3568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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