Justice of SP maintains request against Americanas for seizure of emails for early production of evidence

The Justice of São Paulo denied Americanas’ request for the seizure of e-mail boxes of members of the retailer’s board and board to be suspended for the purpose of producing evidence in advance.

Last Thursday (26), the Justice of São Paulo accepted a request made by Bradesco and authorized the search and seizure of e-mails from directors and members of the Board of Directors and Audit of Americanas in the last ten years.

The bank’s request, which has approximately R$ 4.7 billion in credits with the retailer, was the subject of an appeal by Americanas, alleging, among other issues, the incompetence of the body that approved the bank’s request to decide on the matter.

In this Thursday’s decision, Judge Ricardo Negrão stated that he understood that “the risk of the evidence being lost is relevant and the measures informed by the appellant (Americanas) are insufficient for its preservation”.

By accepting Bradesco’s request last week, the measure signed by Judge Andréa Galhardo Palma, from the 2nd Regional Court of Business Competence and Conflicts Related to Arbitration of the São Paulo Court, was also extended to messages from employees in the accounting and retailer’s finances for the same period of a decade.

In the decision, the judge mentioned that the measure was adopted due to the risk of destroying messages that could help clarify the case. “Given the magnitude of the fact and the potential individual liability of the agents involved in suspected fraud, it is reasonable to assume that relevant and necessary evidence to verify the occurrence of illicit facts is at risk of perishing”, she mentions.

On Tuesday (31), the retailer announced in a statement to the market that, since the beginning of the accounting crisis it is going through, it has hired consultants and experts to preserve the company’s databases, with the aim of collaborating with investigations . Digital information, according to the statement, is being stored and recorded.

The following day, the company asked the Court that the documents and emails seized in an inspection related to the company be kept confidential. The request was accepted by the Court of Justice of São Paulo.

Judge Andréa Galhardo Palma, from the 2nd Regional Court of Business Competence and Conflicts Related to Arbitration, determined in the decision that “procedural secrecy should be attributed, only to documents, emails, other data, etc. until a screening is carried out by the appointed expert, who will remain as their faithful depositary”.

*With information from Reuters