According to information gathered by PÚBLICO, Rui Pinto is in Paris with European authorities. The author Football Leaks Testified as a witness by French, German, Belgian and Dutch judges and investigators, it confirms the whistleblower's active cooperation with European authorities.
The whistleblower is being interviewed by the Joint Committee in charge of the ongoing European investigation at the premises of the French public prosecutor's office, the Parquet National Financier. Before his arrest in Budapest in January 2019, Rui Pinto had already cooperated with the authority, particularly in investigations into financial crimes. Although it is not possible to ascertain what this investigation was about, it is almost certain that it centered on the facts exposed by Rui Pinto. Football Leaks Or we Luanda Leagues, Two waves of revelations came from the whistleblower.
Rui Pinto also attended Malta files, using Malta as a privileged jurisdiction for interference and tax enhancement of shell companies. In this case, the Portuguese tax authorities recovered 20 million euros.
Maybe Football Leaks, leading to the arrest of Rui Pinto and a four-year suspended sentence for the first time, the Portuguese collected tens of thousands of documents related to the biggest football clubs. These files include tax evasion, non-compliance fair game Financial and questionable legal practices related to investment funds were exposed, leading to investigations in several countries.
to us Luanda LeaksRui Pinto revealed the methods Isabel dos Santos used to build her wealth, exposing suspicions of corruption and money laundering.
Relations with the French authorities
Rui Pinto has a long relationship with the French authorities. As we have already mentioned, the complainant cooperated with the Gauls even before his arrest. After being handed over to Portugal, the French did everything they could to ensure that their cooperation was not in vain. Unbeknownst to the judicial police, they accessed hard drives seized from Rui Pinto in Budapest and a day later copied information that could access millions of files with evidence of alleged criminal activity.
After a year in detention, Rui Pinto signed a cooperation agreement with the Judiciary Police. He was released in exchange for access to hard drives that Portuguese investigators had tried to decrypt without success.
After learning of this development, French officials returned to action and attempted to renew cooperation. It is now known that this wish was fulfilled by Rui Pinto being used as a witness in a general trial involving four European countries.
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