|
Federal police, who are investigating accusations of illegal
monitoring of citizens by the Brazilian Intelligence Agency (Abin)
during Bolsonaro's 2019-22 administration, served search and
seizure warrants against Carlos, according to the sources.
A police statement said eight warrants were being served in
Brasilia, Rio de Janeiro and two other cities to identify "the
main recipients and beneficiaries of information illegally
produced by Abin through clandestine actions."
The operation was the closest police probes have come to the
far-right Bolsonaro, who has been declared ineligible for office
until 2030 for abuse of power and misuse of the media when
president.
Son Carlos, a city councillor in Rio, was essentially
Bolsonaro's propaganda minister and ran an office inside the
presidential palace suspected of putting out fake news against
his father's political adversaries and authorities that opposed
his actions. Carlos has denied running a fake news operation.
Now he is being investigated for allegedly using data collected
by the Abin agency through an Israeli software called First Mile
used to track the location of private cellphones, a federal
police source told Reuters.
Asked if information received by Carlos from the spy agency was
used to feed fake news against government opponents, the senior
police officer said: "Possibly. Let's delve deeper into this
now."
Carlos is already a target of an investigation opened by the
Supreme Court for allegedly leading a fake news operation from
the presidential office dubbed the "cabinet of hatred."
Last week, federal police launched raids targeting former Abin
head and congressman Alexandre Ramagem, a Bolsonaro loyalist
planning to run for mayor of Rio de Janeiro, as part of the
probe.
Ramagem is suspected of using the spyware to track political
opponents. He has denied wrongdoing.
Supreme Court documents unsealed on Thursday showed that the spy
agency is accused of illegal surveillance on at least three
Supreme Court justices and a former Lower House speaker during
Bolsonaro's presidency.
(Reporting by Lisandra Paraguassu and Ricardo Brito; Writing by
Gabriel Araujo and Anthony Boadle; Editing by Steven Grattan,
Andrew Cawthorne and Nick Macfie)
[© 2024 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.]
Copyright 2022 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may
not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Thompson Reuters is solely responsible for this content.
|
|
