As of Tuesday (11), the Federal Supreme Court (STF) will rule on the so-called 3 nucleus of the coup plot, which was formed mainly by members of the Army Special Forces (FE), the so-called black children, identified by the Public Prosecutor’s Office (PGR) as being responsible for monitoring and planning attacks against authorities such as Minister Alexandre de Moraes. Two of them were on leave while leading the coup’s operational strategy.
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According to the PGR, Colonels Rafael Martinez de Oliveira and Helio Ferreira Lima were at the forefront of the operational strategy of the “Punhal Verde e Amarelo” plan, which envisaged the kidnapping and murder of Moraes, Lula and the then Vice President-elect, Geraldo Alckmin.
As we blogged in September, they were released from their military duties in the final phase of the plan, in a crucial period for monitoring the objectives, between November and December 2022 – that is, after Jair Bolsonaro was defeated by Lula at the ballot box.
The two are among the ten accused in Group 3. According to the PGR, the duo led “field actions aimed at monitoring and neutralizing public authorities” and “contributed to the planning of a coup” that used military and terrorist techniques to eliminate Alexandre de Moraes, Lula and Alkmene.
De Oliveira, as his nom de guerre, served in the Cobisp, Special Operations Command, where black children are concentrated – a kind of elite army force, used in urban guerrilla warfare and counter-guerrilla operations.
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Known to black children as Joe, he was coordinating the coup directly with Bolsonaro’s then-aide, also Lieutenant Colonel Mauro Cid, who took leave between November 21 and December 16 of that year.
According to investigations, de Oliveira was in Brasilia on December 15, in the area that the minister was found to be monitoring. French police also discovered that the then-major was a member of a WhatsApp group called “Cuba 2022,” whose messages were taken from the cell phone of the former Executive Secretary of the General Secretariat of the Presidency, retired General Mario Fernandez.
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Hélio Ferreira Lima had already been on leave since November 7 and did not return to activities until December 6, when the surveillance mission was still underway.
In the time allotted to the 6th Army Division, in Porto Alegre, he traveled from Rio Grande do Sul to Goiânia to join the operation. In the city, he met his colleague, who took him by car to Brasilia.
The Public Prosecutor of the Republic, Paulo Gonet, stressed that the plane ticket between the capital of Rio Grande do Sul and Goiânia was purchased only three days before the trip, which for him reinforces the hypothesis that it was a “trip for special purposes.”
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The complaint does not say whether Ferreira Lima was in Brasilia on December 15, when the 2022 World Cup operation was launched – and later aborted, after it became clear that the armed forces would not join the coup. According to information from the army, he was only given leave again during the year-end holiday, which ran from December 23, 2022 to January 3, 2023.
But both Oliveira and Ferreira Lima were present at the meeting that, according to the National Front and Junit, would have marked the beginning of the planning, on November 12, 2022, at the residence of Bolsonaro’s former deputy candidate, Walter Braga Neto, in Brasilia. According to army information, they have not yet received leave and are working normally. The proximity between the dates suggests that Oliveira’s leave schedule – which according to the Army itself has been left behind as of 2021 – may have occurred due to the plot.
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Even on leave, Oliveira used an official Commando Operations Battalion vehicle to travel between Goiânia and Brasília to carry out surveillance missions.
During this period, according to the PGR complaint, the two soldiers participated in discussing and formulating the Punhal Verde e Amarelo plan. Oliveira in particular played a prominent role in tailoring. According to Mauro Cid’s plea deal, the military man was at the Palacio do Planalto on December 6, when Bolsonaro was to give his approval to the plan in the presence of the lieutenant colonel and Cid.
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Logistics arrangements
From that moment on, Oliveira took logistical measures such as purchasing disposable mobile phones and raising R$100,000 to finance the coup plan. The money, paid by the “agrarians”, according to Cid, was supposed to be delivered by Braga Neto in a wine bag.
It was Oliveira himself who informed Mauro Cid on December 15 that the Moraes kidnapping had been suspended. The Punhal Verde e Amarelo plan was foiled, according to the PGR, because the army leadership did not join the coup plot.
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The previous day, Bolsonaro presented the final version of the exclusion decree to the commanders of the armed forces. Only the Navy Commander, Almir Garnier Santos, made himself available to the then president.
Ferreira Lima had actively participated in the preparation for the 2022 World Cup. Data from phone antennas obtained by the National Front placed him at several observation points, including the area around the Special Forces during a plenary session attended by Alexandre de Moraes and the Melia Hotel, where Lula stayed during the government’s transition period.
The two black children were denounced on charges of armed criminal organization, attempted violent abolition of the democratic rule of law, coup d’état, qualified damages by violence and serious threat against assets of the Union and deterioration of listed assets.
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