Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered on Wednesday (Apr. 1) the execution of arrest and search warrants against businessman Marcelo Conde, accused of financing an illegal scheme to access the financial data of Supreme Court justices, their relatives, and other officials.

The measures were ordered during the second phase of Operation Exfil, which investigates the sale of the data. Federal Police agents were unable to locate the businessman, who lives in Rio de Janeiro.

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According to the investigation, Conde is accused of financing a scheme to illegally obtain confidential tax data protected by law.

Federal Police investigators said Marcelo Conde allegedly provided lists of victims’ records from the Federal Revenue Service and made a cash payment of BRL 4,500 to obtain the data. The information was allegedly accessed illegally by Federal Revenue Service employees, outsourced staff, customs brokers, and intermediaries with access to the systems of the Federal Revenue Service and the Financial Activities Control Council (COAF).

In light of the evidence gathered by the police, Moraes also ordered the lifting of confidentiality on the defendant’s cell phone records and cloud-based data.

Confidentiality

Investigators also discovered that, in addition to Supreme Court justices and their relatives, the tax data of Attorney General Paulo Gonet Branco, ministers of the Federal Court of Accounts (TCU), federal representatives, former senators, heads of federal regulatory agencies, and a former governor were improperly accessed.

In total, the scheme allegedly accessed data from 1,819 people.

In a statement, attorney Nélio Machado noted the businessman’s defense team had not yet had access to the judge’s ruling ordering the measures.

“We learned today of the measures ordered against our client, but we have not yet had access to the ruling. We immediately filed a request to access it and are now awaiting approval to take further action,” stated the defense.