The Brazilian Federal Police have knocked on the door at the house where Jair Bolsonaro spends his summers for the second time in two weeks.
If at the end of January they asked about his son Carlos, this Thursday they came looking for the former president himself for his alleged relationship with the failed coup attempt a year ago.
The far-right, two soldiers who were ministers with him and several advisors from his inner circle are the targets of a police operation that, according to the Brazilian press, includes some 30 searches and four arrest warrants against advisors.
The agents have appeared at the Bolsonaro home in Angra dos Reis, 170 kilometers from Rio de Janeiro, with an order that forces the patriarch to hand over his passport, prohibits him from leaving the country and coming into contact with the rest of the investigations. , according to
O Globo
.
The judicial siege around Bolsonaro Sr. has been tightening since, upon leaving power, he lost his immunity, but never before had the former president been directly approached by the investigators of the most serious case against him, the attempt to abolish the State of right.
It also represents a qualitative leap that among those sought are the reserve generals Walter Braga Netto, who was Minister of Defense, and Augusto Heleno, who directed a critical ministry such as that of Institutional Security.
Another of those targeted is the president of the Liberal Party, in which the former president of Brazil between 2019 and 2022 is a member.
The ongoing operation is part of the investigations into the attempted coup d'état perpetrated by thousands of Bolsonaro supporters on January 8, 2023, a week after Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva assumed power after winning the elections.
The police accuse those investigated, according to the press, of organizing into cells to falsely spread alleged fraud in the 2022 elections in order to legitimize a military intervention that would keep Bolsonaro in power and thereby obtain political advantages.
For two months, thousands of people camped outside military barracks across the country demanding a coup against Lula.
Only after the riot were they dismantled.
The court cases against Bolsonaro Sr. stem from a variety of issues, from coup plotting to trying to keep some jewelry that the Saudi royal family gave him.
Since the Supreme Court announced shortly after the failed riot that it was investigating Bolsonaro for incitement, the case against him has brought little news, but several pawns around him have fallen.
First, the police arrested and imprisoned a police commissioner who was Minister of Justice.
The next person arrested was his private secretary, a soldier who constantly accompanied him and brought him his mobile phone.
Then, on January 29, the agents arrived at the Bolsonaros' summer home in search of Carlos Bolsonaro, a councilor in Rio de Janeiro, who is being investigated for illegal espionage against thousands of his father's adversaries.
Now, it is the leader of the Brazilian right and some of the retired generals and advisors who accompanied him in the Government who are in the crosshairs of the police and judges.
Follow all the information from El PAÍS América on
and
X
, or in our
weekly newsletter
.
Subscribe to continue reading
Read without limits
Keep reading
I am already a subscriber
_