The Supreme rejected the actions of a judge-denialist against his dismissal from the judiciary

The Supreme Court dismissed a complaint by denial judge Rui Fonseca e Castro against the Supreme Council of the Judiciary’s decision to dismiss him from office, in addition to other sanctions such as loss of wages.

In a ruling that Lusa had access to on Tuesday, judges in the Judicial Section of the Supreme Court (STJ) decided to “award a wholly unfounded” protest filed by Rui Fonseca and Castro against the Supreme Council of the Judiciary (CSM) to overturn the decision to remove him from the magistracy.

In the impeachment case, Rui Fonseca y Castro argued that the SBU decision to remove him from the judiciary was due to such flaws as “invalidity due to omission in pronunciation”, “notorious error in the assessment of evidence”, “insufficiency to decide on the merits of the case”. proven” and “an irreducible contradiction in reasoning or between reasoning and decision”.

He also argued that the decision of the HJC – the governing body and discipline of judges – violated the “principle of the independence of the judiciary” and other constitutional principles in relation to another disciplinary sanction in the form of removal from office for not decommissioning between March and March 12, 2021. during the Covid-19 pandemic.

In connection with the challenge action filed by Rui Fonseca and Castro at the STJ, the SCM contested it, asking that the action be dismissed because “the challenged decision does not suffer from any of the alleged shortcomings.”

The Deputy Attorney General of the STJ also gave an opinion “in the sense of dismissing the claim” submitted by Rui Fonseca and Castro.

In a July 14 decision, the STJ concluded that “there is no indication that the CSM intended to syndicate or replace the assessment in a specific process understood as the right to conduct, process, manage and make decisions.” each of the proceedings is under the jurisdiction of a judge who is recognized in the jurisdiction as exclusive to the justice of the peace.”

“That the Defendant Organization (CSM) showed that it intended simply to establish objectively the correctness of the behavior of the author/Rui Fonseca and Castro (strictly and exclusively functional, professional and disciplinary),” the Supreme Court said in the ruling. that “this alleged violation of the principle of judicial independence is therefore unfounded”.

It was previously stated that by reading the evidentiary motivation of the facts presented in the final CSM report, it was verified that the relevant facts were fully taken into account and taken into account in the rationale for the sanction applied to Rui Fonseca e Castro, thus “there is no misjudgment of the circumstances relevant to making a disciplinary decision.

In October 2021, the plenary session of the CSM unanimously decided to dismiss Denialist judge Rui Fonseca e Castro.

Among the grounds for the dismissal of the SCM was the fact that Rui Fonseca i Castro, “using his powers as a judge”, published videos on social networks in which he “encouraged the violation of the law and health regulations” regarding the Covid-19 pandemic.

The plenum of the SCM then decided to sanction Rui Fonseca and Castro for several violations, the first of which was for nine consecutive working days of unjustified and unrecorded absences to the detriment of the judiciary.

Another violation occurred as a result of “he issued an order during a court hearing on March 24, 2021, in which he gave instructions contrary to the provisions of the law regarding Covid-19 health care obligations. pandemic”.

Faced with this set of violations, the SCM Plenum decided to apply a single dismissal sanction in addition to the loss of wages associated with the nine days of unjustified absence.

For the disciplinary process instructor and the CSM, the judge’s negative stance on the pandemic was “supported by conspiracy theories” and raised suspicions about the safety of vaccines and the real purpose of vaccination campaigns.