Censorship against newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo continues

The censorship installed against the newspaper O Estado de São Paulo has already completed 42 days. The judge Dácio Vieira has forbidden the newspaper to publish reports about the Federal Police (similar do Interpol) Faktor Operation, former Boi Barrica Operation, which investigates the president of Brazilian´s Senate, José Sarney. The request for the prohibition has come from the businessman Fernando Sarney, José Sarney´s son.

Fernando´s lawyers accuse O Estado de S. Paulo of practicing crime when it has published pieces of telephone calls recorded with judicial authorization during the Faktor Operation. They argue that the publication of the data hurts the honor of the Sarney family. The records reveal the involvement of the Senate´s president with the hiring of relatives and political godchildren in the government, what´s illegal in the country.

Grupo Estado´Director of Content Ricardo Gandour says that the decision doesn’t change the newspaper´s conduct. “The Estado won´t intimidate itself, as it has never done in its history. The newspaper respects the law, but uses lawful and ethical journalistic methods to bring information of public interest to the society”, he says. O Estado de S. Paulo was charged to pay a fee of nearly U$80 thousand for each report that it publishes about the Faktor Operation.

The newspaper´s lawyer, Manuel Alceu Afonso Ferreira, has taken several measures in order to suspend the censorship. Among them, is a request of exception of suspension (which means to take a judge away from a case, due to his involvement with one of the parts) at the Distrito Federal (D.C.)´s Tribunal of Justice, alleging the bounds between Dácio Vieira and the Sarney family, besides Vieira´s carrier as lawyer at the Senate. The requirements are still waiting for judgment.