Defense in Brazil corruption trial rejects charges

The defense in Brazil's biggest ever bribery trial on Monday rejected charges against the main defendants and asked that the case be dismissed for lack of evidence. Thirty-eight former ministers, lawmakers, businessmen and bankers face prosecution before the Supreme Court over alleged vote-buying in Congress from 2002 to 2005 during the first term of president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. None of the 38 accused have been arrested, and none were in court. The trial opened last Thursday, with Supreme Court Justice Carlos Ayres Britto naming each defendant and detailing the charges, which range from embezzlement and money laundering to corruption and fraud. Those found guilty face up to 45 years in prison. On Monday the defense team questioned a prosecution request for the jailing of the 36 of the 38 implicated in the scandal. According to charges that first surfaced in 2005, ruling Workers Party (PT) members allegedly offered bribes to members of Congress in exchange for their votes. Prosecutors allege that the bribe money was skimmed from the advertising budgets of state-owned companies through a company owned by businessman Marcos Valerio de Souza, one of the accused. The lawyer for Jose Dirceu, Lula's former chief of staff, who allegedly masterminded the bribery scheme, called for his client to be absolved, arguing that there was no evidence of wrongdoing against him. "It is not true that there was any vote-buying. It is not true that Jose Dirceu, as well as the other accused, offered money to legislative allies to get them to vote with the government," said lawyer Jose Luis de Oliveira. Luis Fernando Pacheco, a defense counsel for Jose Genoino, who was president of the Workers Party at the time, also called for his client to be cleared. "There is no concrete fact that warrants Genoino's sentencing," he said, dismissing the scandal as a "farce". Lula, the 66-year-old founder and leader of the PT is not among the defendants. The ex-president, who is recovering from throat cancer, has maintained that he was betrayed and offered public apologies on behalf of the PT. The party denied any vote-buying in a statement ahead of the trial. Attorney General Roberto Gurgel has called the case "the most daring and outrageous corruption scheme and embezzlement of public funds ever seen in Brazil." The trial is expected to last one month. It could affect the outcome of municipal elections in October, which are expected to chart the political map for the 2014 presidential vote. This is Brazil's highest-profile corruption scandal since president Fernando Collor de Melo resigned in 1992 after serving half of his four-year term in office. A Senate trial found him guilty of corruption and barred him from public office for eight years.