Ana Rita Cavaco, chairman of the Order of Nurses, was accused by the Public Ministry (MP) of two crimes of defamation, following a publication he made on the social network Facebook, where he claimed that Jorge Botelho, at the time Secretary of State for Decentralization and Local Administration and former mayor of Tavira, and his wife Margarida Flores, the regional director of Faro from the Social Security Institute, as well as other family members, had been vaccinated against Covid-19 out of turn.
Following the criminal proceedings for defamation presented by the couple, the Public Prosecutor's Office filed an indictment, in which it considers that Ana Rita Cavaco committed, "in material authorship in the consummated form, two crimes of defamation".
At issue is a publication in which the chairman raised the suspicion that Jorge Botelho and Margarida Flores had already been vaccinated, at a time when the vaccination process against Covid-19 was still at a very early stage.
At the end of January 2021, Ana Rita Cavaco made a post in which she claimed to have heard that Margarida Flores «took her, they say, from her family and some socialist friends and played queuing and smart kids getting the vaccine».
«If so, the amount of frets per square meter in the country, which is tiny, is unbearable! Oh hideous creatures, fine flower of the rubble! Who are these, my God?” he wrote.
Contacted by Sul Informação, shortly after the publication was made, Jorge Botelho and Margarida Flores assured that they had not been vaccinated against Covid-19, «nor any member of our family».
This same clarification was provided to the author of the post who, even so, did not delete it, limiting herself to adding more text: «However, SE Jorge Botelho called me, now I fixed the name, saying that he was not vaccinated, nor was he vaccinated. , nor the wife, but who has criteria to be. He got bored with what people say. I thought I should put his position here but I confess I was confused, it wasn't but there's criteria. I remembered something else too, the criteria in this country for having a high public office, family».
The criterion mentioned by Jorge Botelho is the cardiovascular disease he suffers from, in addition to being asthmatic. At the time, the former member of the Government had suffered a myocardial infarction a few months earlier.
In the text of the indictment, to which the Sul Informação had access, and referring to the initial post and the addendum, the MP considers that «the defendant did not refrain from acting, as described above, using, for the purpose, her profile on the social network Facebook, which is public and had at the time of the facts about 18434 followers».
The reach of the publication is also highlighted: 290 shares and 64 comments.
The Public Prosecutor's Office also considers that Ana Rita Cavaco acted with "the concrete purpose of, through the means of communication/social network, casting suspicion as to possible conduct" by Margarida Flores, "without first ascertaining the veracity of the accusations she made", as well as «formulating judgments» regarding Jorge Botelho.
All of this «well aware that the statements (...) were likely to harm, as they did, the good name, honor and consideration» of those concerned.
"The defendant always acted freely, deliberately and consciously, well aware that her conduct was prohibited and punished by law", reads the text of the indictment.
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