(Rio de Janeiro) Two detainees suspected of belonging to a gang that planned an assassination attempt on former anti-corruption judge and former Brazilian Justice Minister Sergio Moro were stabbed to death in prison, a t -we learned on Tuesday from the prison authorities.
“Three inmates confessed to being the perpetrators of this double homicide and the police are investigating the involvement of a fourth,” said the Secretariat of the Penitentiary Administration of the State of Sao Paulo (south-east) in a press release .
According to the state’s security services, the murders were committed on Monday “with knives” in a prison in Presidente Venceslau, about 650 km from Sao Paulo, the largest metropolis in Latin America.
The two individuals killed by fellow prisoners were arrested in March 2023, as part of a vast police operation aimed at dismantling a criminal network which intended to assassinate political figures. Nine people were arrested.
Police sources confirmed to AFP at the time that Senator Sergio Moro, former Minister of Justice under far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, was one of the targets of this gang linked to the First Commando of the Capital (PCC), one of the main criminal factions that dominate drug trafficking in Latin America.
In 2019, when he was minister, Mr. Moro ordered the transfer to high security prisons of the historic leader of the PCC, Marcos Willian Herbas, known as “Marcola”, and 21 other members of this criminal gang.
A prosecutor in charge of the case told the G1 site that this double homicide committed in prison could have been carried out to “erase the traces” of the assassination plans.
As a judge, Sergio Moro became famous for his role in the mega anti-corruption operation “Lavage-Express”, notably targeting the current left-wing president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, before his return to power in January 2023.
In 2017, he sentenced Lula at first instance to more than nine months in prison for corruption and money laundering. The latter was incarcerated for 18 months in 2018 and 2019.
In 2021, the Supreme Court overturned all of Lula’s convictions, finding that Judge Moro had been “biased”.