The former vice-mayor of Portimão council, Luís Carito, has regularly to present himself at the local police station from now on, after nearly 6 months of wearing an electronic ankle bracelet.
Luís Carito and Jorge Campos, formerly the vice-mayor and a councilor at Portimão council; the head of Portimão Urbis, Lélio Branca, and Artur Curado and Luís Marreiros from Pictures Portugal all were arrested last June on suspicion of corruption, maladministration and money laundering.
The former vice-mayor was the only one of the accused to be remanded in custody, released after two weeks but remaining under house arrest and ordered to wear an electronic bracelet.
The defence team for the accused asked today that the terms of Carito’s bail should be changed. Judge Carlos Alexandre of the Central Criminal Court of Lisbon accepted the request and said that Luís Carito should be subject to periodic presentation to the authorities.
Luís Carito is still banned from holding public office but is allowed to work, he currently practices as a doctor at the Portimão health centre.
The other four defendants were released on €20,000 bail each after their initial court appearances. They are banned from contacting each other and not allowed to leave the country.
The former councilor and the administrator of Portimão Urbis were also suspended from holding any sort of public office.
The arrests were part of an ongoing investigation relating to the activity and management of Portimão Urbis. Luís Carito and Jorge Campos were, at the date of the alleged offences in 2011, on the board of the municipal company.
The five accused are alleged to have colluded in stripping cash from Portimão Urbis by setting up fictitious contracts with other private companies, including Pictures Portugal.
Sancho Carvalho Nunes, Luís Carito’s lawyer, admitted that the fact that his client had swallowed a document that he snatched from a Judicial Police officer during the initial house search, might have been decisive in the fact the Carito was locked up for two weeks, rather than bailed like the others.
The lawyer said back in June 2013 that his client’s behaviour was that of someone "who was not in a lucid and rational state," when Luís Carito received an early morning visit from PJ officers.
One of the key aspects of the investigation relates to the Pictures Portugal project, a private initiative to create a cinema city in Portimão. Another part of the investigation which has gone on for two years so far, covers contracts involving the Portimão stadium rebuilt in 2010 at a cost of between €800,000 and €1 million.
The current mayor of Portimão, Isilda Gomes, is cooperating fully with investigations and was in Lisbon last Friday at a meeting with the Committee for Municipal Financial Recovery. This government committee was created last December and is mandated to draw up legislative proposals to regulate the Municipal Support Fund and the Municipal Investment Fund, both of which the hugely indebted Portimão council is in dire need of.
Gomes had the opportunity to make known that she is conducting an independent internal audit of the past management Portimão council which led to “the difficult financial situation that the municipality finds itself in."
There will be other areas to unpick as the investigation runs its course, especially if links are revealed between the arrested men and the Autodrome do Algarve project built in the Portimão area.
