[ Workers’ party leader had been held for 580 days for
corruption. Court rules incarceration unlawful until appeals
exhausted. ] [[link removed]]

LULA WALKS FREE FROM PRISON  
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Dom Phillips
November 8, 2019
The Guardian
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_ Workers’ party leader had been held for 580 days for corruption.
Court rules incarceration unlawful until appeals exhausted. _

Brazil's ex-President Lula freed from prison , Al Jazeera

 

Brazil’s former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva
[[link removed]] has been
released from prison after a supreme court ruling that delighted his
supporters and infuriated followers of the far-right president Jair
Bolsonaro.

Lula, who was serving a 12-year corruption sentence, was greeted by
hundreds of supporters wearing red vests emblazoned with his face
outside the federal police headquarters in the city of Curitiba, where
he had been imprisoned for 580 days.

In a speech to the crowd, Lula thanked party militants who had camped
outside throughout his imprisonment, and attacked the “rotten
side” of the police, prosecutors, tax office and justice system for
jailing him.

“They did not imprison a man. They tried to kill an idea,” he said
[[link removed]].
“Brazil did not improve, Brazil got worse. The people are going
hungry. The people are unemployed. The people do not have formal jobs.
People are working for Uber – they’re riding bikes to deliver
pizzas.”

Lula was imprisoned in April 2018 after a sentence
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for corruption and money laundering handed down by the controversial
judge Sergio Moro was upheld by an appeal court. He has always
proclaimed his innocence and argued the case against him was
politically motivated.

On Thursday, Brazil’s supreme court ruled defendants could only be
imprisoned after all appeals to higher courts had been exhausted
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paving the way for Lula and another 5,000 prisoners to be freed.

The decision followed revelations on investigative website the
Intercept Brasil that Moro had colluded with prosecutors
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the sweeping corruption investigation, known as Operation Car Wash,
into bribes and kickbacks at the state oil company Petrobras that
imprisoned Lula, powerful business leaders, middlemen and politicians
from his Workers’ party and its political allies.

Polls had showed Lula was leading in last year’s presidential
election, but the conviction removed him from the race, giving
Bolsonaro a clear run.

Bolsonaro then named Moro his justice minister
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heightening the sense of injustice. The president appeared to
recognize the former judge’s contribution in a speech on Friday.
“If he hadn’t accomplished his mission, I wouldn’t be here
either,” Bolsonaro said
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As president from 2003 to 2010, Lula presided over an extraordinary
period of economic growth and reduction of inequality as innovative
cash transfer schemes took tens of millions out of poverty. Even in
prison he has cast a long shadow over Brazilian politics – and his
release is only likely to widen bitter political divides.

“A free Lula increases polarisation, which could increase
Bolsonaro’s support,” said Maurício Santoro, a professor of
international relations at the State University of Rio de Janeiro.
“On the other hand, his charisma and political ability will make the
opposition more effective against Bolsonaro. As leader of the
opposition, Lula has more international prestige than the
president.”

Bolsonaro did not immediately react to Lula’s release, but Eduardo
Bolsonaro, the president’s congressman son, tweeted
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leftists celebrating the news were “shitting on society’s head”.

Controversy swirled around the supreme court decision – the third
time it had changed its mind on the issue in 10 years. Richer
Brazilians have traditionally dragged out legal processes to remain at
liberty until their crimes became erased by the statute of
limitations.

Others imprisoned
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in the same corruption investigation have also requested release –
including Lula’s former chief of staff, José Dirceu, João Vaccari
Neto, the party’s former treasurer, and Renato Duque, a Petrobras
executive embroiled in the scandal.

Nor are Lula’s legal problems over – he faces eight other cases,
according to the Folha de S.Paulo newspaper. His lawyers have called
this legal blitzkrieg “lawfare”. In one case, he was handed a
12-year, 11-month sentence over his alleged ownership of a country
house – a decision the appeal court will consider next week.
Brazil’s Congress is also considering
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measures that could effectively revert the supreme court’s decision.

But Lula was keen to show he had lost none of his fighting spirit.
Earlier on Friday, his official Twitter account posted a video of him
working out to the soundtrack from Rocky.

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