Brazilian politician cleared of graft charges

BRASíLIA, June 20, 2018 – Senator Gleisi Hoffmann, the head of Brazil’s Labour Party, and her husband have been acquitted of corruption and money laundering by the Federal Supreme Court, local media reported on Tuesday.

Caught up in the country’s infamous Operation Car Wash, Senator Hoffmann and former Minister of Communications Paulo Bernardo were charged with embezzling USD 568,000 from NOC Petrobras in 2010 and using it to fund political campaigns.

“Nothing will erase the suffering caused to me and my family, or the damage to my personal and political image, but I look with relief to the day when justice will have the opportunity to absolve me and restore the truth,” the senator said in a statement released before the verdict.

Senator Hoffmann heads the party of former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who since April has been serving a sentence of more than 12 years for accepting bribes in exchange for influencing Petrobras to award contracts to construction firm OAS.

Lula maintains his innocence and has said he will again run for president in Brazil’s October elections.

The Operation Car Wash probe into corrupt practices has become Brazil’s widest-reaching bribery scandal, involving Petrobras and several oil and gas-related companies, as well as politicians in the country and abroad.

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