“It is important to say that for a year we have been leading an investigation into a crime committed five years ago, with the conviction that the Federal Police will already give a definitive answer to the Marielle case in this first quarter,” confirmed Rodrigues to the network. Brazilian Central News Radio.
Franco of the Socialist and Freedom Party and his driver Anderson Gomes were killed on the night of March 14, 2018 in a central neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro.
Thirteen shots from a high-precision HK MP5 submachine gun, used only by elite police forces, hit the vehicle in which they were traveling.
Both families say they have lost hope of solving the crime.
To this day there is no clarity as to who was intellectually responsible for the fatal transgression.
At this stage, the investigation points to the involvement of militia members of the security forces.
On March 14, 2019, retired police officer Ronnie Lessa and former military officer Élcio Queiroz were arrested on charges of being the actual perpetrators of the crime.
The motivation for the murder is still unclear, but Franco was reportedly murdered because of her commitment to human rights.
According to Rodrigues, investigators will provide the federal judiciary with the names of the possible perpetrators of the murder.
Last December, the Minister of Justice and Public Security, Flávio Dino, also promised that the city councilor's death would be fully investigated “shortly.”
Earlier this month, the PF arrested Luiz Paulo de Lemos Jr., alias El Chupeta, Lessa's driver.
The driver was arrested during Operation Clandestine Arsenal in Rio, carried out by this police unit together with the Army's Integrated Organized Crime Fighting Force and Controlled Products Control Service.
Lemos Jr. was also a driver for the so-called Crime Bureau, an organization that committed crimes in the service of militias.
The aim of the police operation was to confiscate around 50 illegal firearms and to arrest Lessa's driver, whose registration as a collector, target shooter and hunter was canceled.
Marielle's case had international impact and made the sociologist and feminist a political symbol in the fight for human rights and the greater participation of black women in spaces of power in Brazil.
After more than five years, the question: “Who ordered the murder of Marielle Franco?” still has no answer.
jha/ocs