Banco Master Secrecy Lifted as Brazil Court Crisis Deepens
Brazil · Justice
Key Facts
—The decision. Supreme Court president Edson Fachin formally asked rapporteur André Mendonça to lift judicial secrecy over the Banco Master investigations; Mendonça complied on Thursday, September 10.
—The scope. The main case file, Petition 15.556, plus at least 14 linked inquiries and petitions, are now open to the public — except steps whose secrecy remains indispensable to ongoing police work.
—Lula’s demand. The president publicly called for the complete removal of secrecy in the Master case — “doa a quem doer” (“let it hurt whoever it hurts”) — denouncing selective leaks he says are poisoning his re-election campaign.
—The contract. Correio Braziliense reported that Banco Master’s contract with the law firm of Justice Alexandre de Moraes’s wife provided for R$108 million net (about US$21 million) in legal fees over three years.
—What is next. On September 15, an extraordinary plenary session will decide whether the Court opens an investigation into Moraes himself.
Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court has lifted judicial secrecy over the Banco Master investigations after a formal request by its president, capping a week in which Lula demanded total disclosure, a R$108 million (about US$21 million) contract with a justice’s wife surfaced, and The Economist warned the court has become a threat to democracy.
The Secrecy Comes Down
The move came in writing on Thursday. Fachin asked Mendonça, the rapporteur of the main Banco Master procedure, to send all case files linked to Petition 15.556 to the Court’s presidency and to every justice, and to lift the secrecy covering the investigation, “except only for what concerns steps whose secrecy is indispensable,” according to reporting by g1, O Globo, UOL and the legal outlet JOTA.
Mendonça complied the same day. Alongside the central petition, the lifting covers inquiries 5.026 and 5.035, a procedural complaint (Reclamação 88.121) and roughly a dozen related petitions — the paper trail of the Federal Police investigation into the collapsed bank and its owner, Daniel Vorcaro, which has lapped at the doors of the Court itself.
The timing is not accidental. On Monday, September 15, the full bench meets in extraordinary session to judge Petition 16.662 — the request to open a formal investigation into Alexandre de Moraes over his office’s contacts with the Master case. Fachin wants every justice to vote with the same documents on the table, not with fragments filtered through leaks.
“Let It Hurt Whoever It Hurts”
President Lula had publicly raised the stakes hours earlier. In an interview with SBT aired Thursday, he said the Court should “investigate everything, disclose everything — doa a quem doer,” a Portuguese expression meaning the truth should come out regardless of who it damages. In posts on social media, he demanded the “complete breaking of secrecy” over the Master investigations and attacked what he called selective leaks dragging his government into the Court’s crisis in the middle of his re-election campaign, Correio Braziliense reported.
The political logic is transparent: with the polls deadlocked less than a month before the October 4 vote, the Master affair — which has already touched allies and relatives across the spectrum, including Flávio Bolsonaro — is one story where the incumbent believes full disclosure hurts his opponents more than him.
The US$21 Million Contract
On Friday, Correio Braziliense added the detail now dominating the debate: the contract between Banco Master and Barci de Moraes Sociedade de Advogados — the law firm of Viviane Barci de Moraes, the justice’s wife — provided for R$108 million net (about US$21 million) in legal fees over three years, structured as 36 monthly installments of R$3 million (about US$582,000). (Conversions use roughly 5.15 reais per US dollar, the September 10 rate.)
The firm’s work for the bank has been reported before, and Moraes has denied any impropriety; the new element is the size and structure of the agreed fees, published days before the plenary decides whether he becomes a formal investigation target. The Rio Times reported earlier this month that Moraes personally edited wording in reporting about the contract dispute, and Brazil’s bar association has opened an ethics case involving the firm.
A Court Judging Itself — and a Country Watching
Fachin spent Thursday in a sequence of individual meetings — with Moraes, with Mendonça, with Justice Cármen Lúcia, and, added late to his public agenda, with Prosecutor-General Paulo Gonet, O Globo reported. Folha de S.Paulo reported that Fachin also spoke with Lula and signaled he intends to take both the Moraes and Mendonça matters to the plenary rather than let them fester in individual chambers.
Outside the court, the aftershocks multiplied. The PT’s national executive approved a resolution defending fixed-term mandates for higher-court justices — an idea unthinkable in the party until this crisis — though party president Edinho Silva conceded no duration has been defined. Deputy Reginaldo Lopes (PT-MG), a government deputy leader, plans to file a constitutional amendment on Monday setting ten-year terms for STF and other superior courts, Correio Braziliense reported.
The Catholic bishops’ conference, CNBB, issued a rare formal note calling for “truth without manipulation” and “justice without privileges,” respect for the law and the separation of powers. And The Economist, long sympathetic to the Court’s stance against Jair Bolsonaro’s coup plotting, wrote that the STF has gone from defender of Brazilian democracy to a threat to it.
In the Senate, pressure on its president, Davi Alcolumbre, intensified: Senator Carlos Viana has publicly demanded he advance the impeachment requests against Moraes or face a challenge to his own leadership — a reminder that the Court’s crisis now has a second front in Congress.
What Monday Will Decide
With the secrecy lifted, the September 15 session becomes the first fully public test of the Court’s cohesion. The justices will decide whether the Federal Police findings about Moraes’s office merit a formal investigation — an unprecedented vote against a sitting member of the bench — at the same time as they judge Mendonça’s parallel moves in the case.
For foreign readers, the essential point is that this is no longer a banking scandal. It is a stress test of the institution that anchored Brazil’s democracy through the 2022 coup attempt — now accused of the opacity it was created to police, three weeks before a presidential election.
Frequently Asked Questions
What exactly was declassified in the Banco Master case?
Rapporteur André Mendonça lifted secrecy on the main case file, Petition 15.556, and at least 14 linked inquiries and petitions, after a formal request by Court president Edson Fachin. Only investigative steps that genuinely require secrecy remain sealed.
What did Lula say about the investigations?
In an SBT interview, Lula said the Supreme Court should “investigate everything, disclose everything — doa a quem doer” (let it hurt whoever it hurts), and he denounced selective leaks he says are harming his re-election campaign.
What is the R$108 million (about US$21 million) contract?
Correio Braziliense reported that Banco Master agreed to pay the law firm of Justice Alexandre de Moraes’s wife R$108 million net (about US$21 million) over three years, in 36 monthly installments of R$3 million (about US$582,000).
Sources
g1 · Correio Braziliense (Lula) · Correio Braziliense (contract) · Brasil de Fato · g1 (PT mandates) · JOTA
Connected Coverage
The secrecy decision is the latest turn in a crisis The Rio Times has covered all week.
Fachin Takes the Supreme Court Crisis Into His Own Hands
Brazil Supreme Feud Escalates: Alexandre de Moraes Edited Wife’s Banco Master Contract
Caiado Asks Supreme Court to Lift Secrecy on Master, INSS Probes
Sources: g1; O Globo; UOL; JOTA; Correio Braziliense; Brasil de Fato; Folha de S.Paulo; Metrópoles.
This article was produced by The Rio Times’ automated newsroom system. How we use AI · Report an error
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