Francisco Teixeira da Mota, Rui Pinto’s lawyer, said on Wednesday he expected criminal investigative judge Cláudia Pina to reduce the number of crimes for which the creator of Football Leaks is accused by the Public Ministry (MP).
Teixeira da Mota explained to journalists, at the entrance of the Criminal Investigation Court (ICT) of Lisbon, before the start of the instructional phase, which aims to decide whether the process continues and in what manner for judgment, which only required the opening of instructions with the aim to reduce the 147 crimes of illegitimate access, breach of correspondence, computer sabotage and extortion attempts that its constituent is accused of.
The lawyer said that Rui Pinto did not ask to speak at this stage, but that he “will speak when he has to speak”, adding that he expects the criminal investigating judge to “legally frame” the facts contained in the prosecution of the MP.
For Teixeira da Mota, it is not a question of his client not going to trial, but rather correcting “legal aspects”, such as the duplication of crimes.
The lawyer also said that Rui Pinto is “a person with strength” and that he has already been notified of the extraction of certificates for the Portuguese justice to pursue further investigations on the performance of its constituent.
Aníbal Pinto, lawyer at the time of the facts of Rui Pinto and the second defendant in the lawsuit, for involvement in the alleged attempt to extort the Doyen investment fund, told journalists that he hopes to prove “the truth” and his “innocence”.
“All my activity was as a lawyer and all I did was to cure the interests of clients, always within the legal framework”, underlined Aníbal Pinto, at the entrance of the ICT of Lisbon.
The instruction was requested by the defense of the two defendants in the case: Rui Pinto and his lawyer, at the time of the facts, Aníbal Pinto.
Aníbal Pinto is scheduled to be questioned in the morning, who, in the request for opening an instruction, asked to be heard by JIC Cláudia Pina.
The interrogation will be behind closed doors, but the instructive debate, which will follow and in which the Public Ministry and the defense of the defendants will set out the grounds for taking the defendants to trial or not, and the reading of the instructive decision will be public.
The extortion attempt concerns Doyen (between 500 thousand and one million euros), carried out by Rui Pinto, in October 2015, with the intermediation of the lawyer Aníbal Pinto, with the counterpart of the creator of Football Leaks not reveal confidential documents of this investment fund.
This face-to-face meeting took place at a service station on the A5 motorway, in Oeiras, between Nélio Lucas, legal representative of Doyen Sports, and Aníbal Pinto, then Rui Pinto’s lawyer.
On September 19, the Public Ministry (MP) accused Rui Pinto of 147 crimes, 75 of which were illegitimate access, 70 of violation of correspondence, seven of them aggravated, one of computer sabotage and one of extortion attempt, for accessing the systems information technology from Sporting, the Doyen investment fund, the law firm PLMJ, the Portuguese Football Federation and the Attorney General’s Office, and subsequent disclosure of dozens of confidential documents from these entities.
The law firm PLMJ was part of the defense of Benfica in the process known as ‘e-mole’.
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