Accused of killing security guards are acquitted for the 2nd time on the coast of SP; understand

The security guard was driving a motorcycle when he was shot dead on the corner of Avenida Afonso Pena and Rua Oswaldo Cruz. Witnesses called the Military Police (PM) and reported that the suspects were occupants of a car, which had been stolen hours earlier in the Ponta da Praia neighborhood.

A PM team spotted a vehicle with the same characteristics reported by witnesses and carried out the approach. Flávio and William were arrested in the act after getting out of the car on the corner of Brás Cubas and Xavier da Silveira streets.

The duo denied participation in the crime and ownership of the car. Flávio and William claimed that they were walking with call girls when they were approached by police officers. The PM team seized three pistols that, according to agents, were with the accused inside the vehicle.

The first trial was held on July 10, 2019. At the time, the men were acquitted of murder, but ended up being convicted of the crime of receiving possession of the stolen car.

For the crime of reception, each defendant was sentenced to two years and four months in semi-open prison. This offense was not judged in the second jury, as it has already expired — that is, the legal deadline to carry out an action or collect a right has ended.

The MP-SP filed an appeal against the acquittal for murder and the São Paulo Court of Justice (TJ-SP) understood that the jurors' decision was contrary to the evidence in the case. For this reason, the first trial was annulled.

The second trial lasted around ten hours and took place last Wednesday (11). According to the sentencing document, the jurors recognized the materiality of the crime of qualified homicide, but did not attribute responsibility to the accused.

"Once the attribution of authorship is ruled out, the acquittal of the accused is necessary, as their responsibility for the criminal act alleged in the complaint was not recognized", wrote judge Thais Caroline Brecht Esteves, from the Jury and Criminal Executions Court, in the decision.

During the trial, lawyers Eugenio Malavasi and Fábio Zilliotti, responsible for Flávio's defense, highlighted the fragility of the evidence due to the negative residual examination, in addition to the failure to demonstrate the motivation for the crime on the part of the MP-SP.

🔎The residuographic examination is carried out to detect traces of a firearm shot on the hands, clothes or surfaces associated with a suspect.