BANCOOP case
On October 28, 2010, Judge Patricia Inigo Funes e Silva, of the 5th Criminal Court of São Paulo, accepted the complaint against João Vaccari Neto and five other people involved in the case of embezzlement through BANCOOP.
[1] Founded in 1996, by Representative Ricardo Berzoini (former president of the Workers Party), BANCOOP had been investigated by prosecutors since 2007 for money laundering, overpricing and diversion of resources.
[clarification needed] BANCOOP was one of the largest real estate developers in the state of São Paulo, with more than 15,000 members, and even received large financial contributions totaling more than R$40 million, since 2003, mostly through pension funds controlled by people linked to the PT.
[2] On March 10, 2010, the magazine Veja revealed that the Public Ministry of São Paulo reportedly had access to more than 8,000 pages of bank records of transactions carried out by BANCOOP between 2001 and 2008.
Some of the suspicious activities included R$432,000 in donations to the Workers Party, R$162,000 in the purchasing of apartments for BANCOOP, R$153,000 in profit-sharing, and R$27,000 injected into an NGO owned by Malheiros.
[6] On October 19, 2010, Jose Carlos Blat, the Public Prosecutor of the state of São Paulo, presented a complaint to the 5th Criminal Court, accusing the former directors of the cooperative (João Vaccari Neto, Tomas Edson Botelho Fraga, Ana Maria Ernica, Henir de Oliveira, BANCOOP's lawyer, Leticia Achur Antonio and Helena Conceição Pereira Lage, the president of Germany Empreiteira) of larceny, attempted larceny, conspiracy, misrepresentation, and money laundering.
[9] On March 13, 2012, in a unanimous decision, the 10th Private Law Chamber of the State Court of Justice ruled to pierce the corporate veil of BANCOOP, which in practice forces its leaders and former representatives (Ricardo Berzoini and Joao Vaccari Neto) to reimburse the cooperative in the amount relating to the damages that were suffered.
Justice of São Paulo summarily dismissed charged against former PT treasurer and member João Vaccari Neto and other defendants.
According to judge Maria Priscilla Ernandes Veiga Oliveira, of 4ª Vara Criminal de São Paulo, prosecution charges were based on mere allegations, presented in a superficial way.
