RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) – A Brazilian court ordered that former Rio de Janeiro Governor Sergio Cabral be released from house arrest on Thursday, but the politician still faces corruption charges.
In ordering Cabral’s release, the court criticized “the extensive time period in which the present criminal action is being processed, without a final conviction that can’t be appealed.”
Cabral is the last prominent person imprisoned in the infamous Lava Jato’s criminal corruption scandal that upended Brazilian politics over several years.
The federal court that ordered Cabral’s release from house arrest also ruled he should wear an ankle monitoring device and remain in Brazil.
The Lava Jato, or Car Wash, case uncovered a multi-billion-dollar graft and bribery scheme, mainly involving Brazil’s national oil company Petrobras and led to the convictions of dozens of business executives and well-known politicians, including President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, though his conviction was later thrown out.
The investigation into the scandal was dramatised in the Netflix series O Mecanismo.
Cabral, who had been under house arrest since late last year, was convicted in more than 20 criminal cases which carry a total possible prison term of some 400 years, but he can still appeal them.
(Reporting by Rodrigo Viga Gaier; Writing by Carolina Pulice; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)
