AGU calls for Wallace ban from sport, says post ‘not free speech’

The AGU (Advocacy General of the Union) asked the COB (Ethics Council of the Brazilian Olympic Committee) and the CBV (Brazilian Volleyball Confederation) to initiate disciplinary proceedings against Wallace de Souza and ban the athlete from the sport. The player, who is currently in the opposite position of Cruzeiro, asked his followers last Tuesday (31) if “someone would shoot 12 in the face” of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT).

In addition to the ban, the federal body asks the Council to apply the maximum penalty: a fine of R$ 100,000, and argues that Wallace’s post “is not protected by the right to freedom of expression.

The entity also states that it is the duty of athletes “to ‘reject with energy’ any violent manifestation arising from political preference, both in sports and outside it”.

After the repercussions of the case, the player apologized on social networks and said he made a mistake. “I made a mistake and I’m here apologizing because when you make a mistake, there’s no way around it, you have to accept the mistake and apologize.”

The board of Cruzeiro punished the player and requested the removal and indefinite suspension of the sportsman, and stated that he demanded an immediate retraction. “The club demanded from the athlete Wallace a full retraction and an apology to all who were offended by his posts,” he said in a statement.

CHECK IT OUT AGU’S NOTE

The Advocacy General of the Union (AGU) presented representations in disfavor of the volleyball player Wallace Leandro de Souza to the Ethics Council of the Brazilian Olympic Committee (COB) and to the Brazilian Volleyball Confederation (CBV). On his profile on the social network Instagram, the athlete promoted a poll asking whether someone would “shoot in the face” of the President of the Republic, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

In the representation addressed to the COB, the AGU points out the violation of article 243-D (public incitement to hatred or violence) of the Brazilian Code of Sports Justice, and articles 8 and 34 of the Code of Ethical Conduct of the COB, respectively the misuse of discriminatory expressions and incitement to acts of violence through social networks.

As a consequence, the AGU requests the Council to initiate disciplinary proceedings against the athlete, and to apply the maximum penalties provided for in both codes: a fine of R$ 100,000 and banishment from Olympic sport.

In the representation, the AGU also argues that Wallace’s conduct constitutes the crime of incitement to crime (art. 286 of the Brazilian Penal Code), and that the manifestation of hatred carried out by the player in his social network is not protected by the right to freedom of expression. expression, “since no one is authorized to commit a crime invoking this fundamental freedom”. The Union’s lawyers who subscribe to the document also require the COB to authorize the AGU to act as an interested third party in the process initiated by the Committee to investigate the athlete’s conduct.

For the same reasons contained in the document forwarded to the COB, the AGU also presented another representation in disfavor of the player to the CBV. In the latter case, the Attorney General’s Office also requests the initiation of disciplinary proceedings to investigate Wallace’s conduct.

In the play, AGU maintains that Wallace violated art. 43 of the entity’s Code of Ethics and Discipline, which establishes the duty of athletes to “reject with energy” violent manifestations arising from political preference, both in sports and outside it. And also article 243-D (public incitement to hatred or violence) of the Brazilian Code of Sports Justice.

The AGU requires the CBV to apply the maximum penalties provided for in the governing rules, that is, the adoption of written censure, fine and suspension.