Brazil Supreme Court Shelves Bolsonaro Spy-Agency Probe but Keeps Focus on His Son

Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes on Monday closed the part of an investigation into former President Jair Bolsonaro linked to the so-called “parallel Abin” case, while ordering a lower federal court to continue examining allegations against Bolsonaro’s son Carlos.

According to single-source reporting by O Globo, Moraes concluded that evidence collected in the inquiry had already been used in the case that led to Bolsonaro’s conviction for attempting to stage a coup after the 2022 election. The Supreme Federal Court, Brazil’s highest court, had already analyzed the strand of the investigation tied to Bolsonaro and the alleged plan to disrupt the country’s democratic order.

The case centers on allegations that a parallel structure operated inside Abin, Brazil’s intelligence agency, during Bolsonaro’s presidency. Investigators say the network was used to monitor political opponents, produce dossiers and spread false information in line with the political interests of the then president’s circle.

The inquiry began after O Globo reported in March 2023 that Abin had acquired and used a tool called FirstMile. The system allegedly exploited a vulnerability in Brazil’s mobile phone network to track the location of selected targets across the country.

Moraes followed a recommendation from Prosecutor General Paulo Gonet, who argued that the Supreme Court’s work on the portion directly tied to Bolsonaro and the alleged institutional rupture had been completed. Gonet said searches, seizures, breaches of confidentiality and witness interviews from the Abin inquiry had already supported criminal cases involving Bolsonaro, former Abin chief Alexandre Ramagem, Giancarlo Gomes Rodrigues and Marcelo Araújo Bormevet.

Bolsonaro was not included in the final list of people indicted in the parallel Abin investigation because he was already facing an organized-crime charge in the separate coup-plot case, O Globo reported.

The Supreme Court did not end the case entirely. Moraes sent the remaining inquiry to the Federal Regional Court of the 1st Region, known as TRF-1, so it can continue proceedings involving Carlos Bolsonaro, a former Rio de Janeiro city councilman and one of the former president’s sons.

Brazil’s Federal Police had identified Carlos Bolsonaro as a coordinator of the alleged structure, according to O Globo. Investigators said he took part in suspected campaigns involving disinformation, the disclosure of confidential information and attacks on Brazil’s electoral system, the Supreme Court, its justices and political opponents.

Moraes said the accusations involving Carlos Bolsonaro and other people under investigation concern the production, circulation or disclosure of information, social-media activity, document drafting, political coordination and the spread of content considered disinformation, particularly against the Supreme Court and its members.

The decision narrows the Supreme Court’s role in the parallel Abin case while keeping alive investigations into alleged misuse of state intelligence tools and political communications networks during the Bolsonaro administration.