“It is not positive to have a judge being judged, as is evident. However, this also indicates the health of the justice system, meaning that the justice system works,” stated the president of ASJP.
Recalling that “any accused person must benefit from the presumption of innocence,” Nuno Matos added that Operation Lex, which involves alleged corruption crimes, “is an isolated case.”
“It is not, so to speak, a systemic problem within the judiciary itself, far from it. This is an absolutely isolated case,” concluded the leader of ASJP.
The trial of Operation Lex, involving the former president of the Lisbon Court of Appeal Luís Vaz das Neves and the former president of Benfica Luís Filipe Vieira, begins on Wednesday at the Supreme Court of Justice in Lisbon.
The case, revealed in 2018, comprises 16 defendants, and the investigation focused on the activities conducted by former appeal judges Rui Rangel, Fátima Galante, and Luís Vaz das Neves, who, according to the Public Prosecutor’s Office, used their positions at the Lisbon Court of Appeal to obtain undue advantages for themselves or others.
The allegations include crimes of corruption, abuse of power, undue receipt of benefits, tax fraud, money laundering, document forgery, and usurpation of functions.
