Brazil's Supreme Court sentenced a Bolsonarist deputy to eight years in prison for several videos he uploaded to its networks

On Wednesday, Brazil's Supreme Court sentenced Deputy Daniel Silveira, a far-right leader led by President Jair Bolsonaro, to eight years and nine months in prison for “continuous attacks” against democratic institutions.

The way for the conviction was opened by the investigator in the case, Judge Alexandre de Moraes, who denied all the allegations of the defense, who argued that the threats and “public incitement to violence and the closure of Congress and the Supreme” attributed to Silveira were protected by “parliamentary immunity”.

The conviction was supported by ten of the members of the court and the only one who ruled against it was Kassio Nunes, who reached the Supreme Court proposed by Bolsonaro in 2020 and said that, although there were “notorious offenses” on the part of Silveira, “there is no crime in that”.

However, the deputy was found guilty even by Judge André Mendonça, a member of the Supreme Court since last year and also nominated by Bolsonaro, of whom he was Minister of Justice and who supported the sentence, although he proposed a lesser sentence.

The sentence was also supported by the Office of the Attorney General, which pronounced itself at the trial as an accusatory party.

On behalf of that body, Prosecutor Lindora Araújo argued that the legislator committed the crimes of “coercion, incitement to violence, violations of the rule of law and democratic institutions and attempting to prevent their operation by serious threat”.

Lawyer Paulo César Rodrigues, the deputy's defender, alleged that his client suffered a “violation of due process”, as the Supreme Court established himself as “victim, accuser, judge and is the one who determines investigations and orders imprisonment.”

Silveira, a member of the far-right groups that support Bolsonaro, was arrested last February after he published videos on his social networks with serious threats and insults of all caliber against the Supreme Magistrates, whom he demanded to be dismissed in full.

He also criticized the constitutional order and praised the military dictatorship (1964-1985), as well as the military regime's persecution of “communism”, and suggested its support for the assassination of opponents of the government of Jair Bolsonaro.

He also participated in the call for anti-democratic acts, some encouraged by Bolsonaro himself, in which the ruler was required to “close” both the Supreme Court and Parliament through a “military intervention”.

Silveira was sanctioned by the Ethics Council of the Chamber of Deputies, which in July 2021 suspended his mandate for six months, and resumed his legislative activity this year.

Last November, he was granted parole on the condition that he did not use his social networks or have contact with other persons investigated in the same process.

However, he continually violated these precautionary measures and last month he disrespected a court order that imposed the use of an electronic anklet, although he ended up accepting it after two days locked up in the Chamber of Deputies.

This Wednesday, always challenging, Silveira said in a speech to Congress that De Moraes is a “marginal” who “thinks he is a wren of Brazil”, but he is “a frustrated boy who only has courage behind a table”.

Afterwards, he went with Deputy Eduardo Bolsonaro, the president's son, to the seat of the Supreme Court to try to attend the trial, which was prevented because the court's rules do not allow it.

(With information from EFE)

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