Court Fines Bolsonarist Entrepreneur for Fake News About ex-Deputy Jean Wyllys

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Entrepreneur Otávio Fakhoury was ordered to pay R$41,800 (US$8,360) in compensation to ex-Federal Member Jean Wyllys for fake news associating him with Adélio Bispo – the perpetrator of the 2018 knife attack on President Jair Bolsonaro.

Fakhoury will also be forced to publicly retract, on the same social media in which he shared the fake news against Wyllys – according to the Federal Police, there is no link between the former Deputy and the perpetrator of the knife attack on Bolsonaro. If the decision is not complied with, the entrepreneur will be charged a daily fine of R$10,000.

In an interview with the newspaper O Globo, Fakhoury announced that he intends to appeal the ruling, claiming he was not the creator of the false news and only have another user’s content. “I wanted to share it so that my followers on Twitter could read the text that Alberto Saraiva posted on Facebook,” he said.

The fact that Fakhoury had not been the originator of the false news, however, was taken into account by Judge Mônica de Paula Baptista, of the 5th Special Civil Court in Rio. In her ruling, the magistrate states that “despite the fact that it is a reproduction of a text prepared by a third party, as claimed by the defendant, this does not remove his responsibility in reproducing it.”

In May, Jean Wyllys filed legal proceedings with the Rio de Janeiro Appeals Court (TJ-RJ) against some of Bolsonaro’s supporters.

Fakhoury is among those investigated by the STF (Federal Supreme Court) in inquiries into the production of false news. In June, he admitted that he financed demonstrations in favor of the Bolsonaro government by supplying vehicles for the protests. Fakhoury also said he had done likewise in 2016, during the impeachment of then-President Dilma Rousseff.

In the fake news inquiry, which focuses mainly on attacks on the STF and governmental institutions, Fakhoury emerges as a member of Whatsapp business groups that organized actions with a political nature. He admitted his presence in a group with Luciano Hang, owner of Havan, but says he does not know Edgard Corona, the owner of the Smart Fit gyms network.

Source: UOL