Mario Machado remains silent during the trial. He is accused of raping leftist women.

This Tuesday, the far-right activist Mario Machado remained silent in the trial in which he is accused of discrimination and incitement to hatred and violence against left-wing women, namely Renata Cambra (MAS).

Another defendant, Ricardo Pais, charged with the same crime for messages on an old Twitter account in which he called for the rape of left-wing women, also chose not to enter a plea before Judge Paula Martins and prosecutor Teresa Silveira Santos.

We are talking about messages published on Twitter by (now BUT) Renata Cambra.

Hearing at the trial as an assistant in the trial, Renata Cambra said that after learning about the content of the publication, which was directed in particular against her, she felt that “they were putting a target on her back” and began to fear possible actions. right-wing extremists seeking to demonstrate loyalty to Mario Machado.

Renata Cambra told the court the incident forced her to change her daily routine: she stopped traveling alone at night, changed the hours she took her dog for walks and began paying more attention to the people around her.

He also rejected the idea that the messages were simply “humor and irony”, criticizing misogyny and hate speech, which he considered a “very dangerous” situation for women on the left.

In response to questions from her lawyer García Pereira, Renata Cambra argued that the publications in question must necessarily belong to Mario Machado, since they reveal details of the defendant’s life about which only he himself has information or access, as in the case of the photograph of his daughter.

At Tuesday’s hearing, the court also heard from two witnesses, friends of Renata Cambra, who described the effect of anxiety, worry and uncertainty that these messages caused on Renata Cambra and themselves, warning that Mario Machado’s social media posts had more than 2,500 followers.

The indictment drawn up by the prosecutor’s office in the criminal case of Renata Cambra concludes that the defendants knew that they were insulting the honor and respect of all activists of the left parties and, in particular, Renata Cambra.

The trial will continue on the 27th and will hear diplomat Ana Gomes and deputy Isabel Moreira, as well as other witnesses appointed by García Pereira, representative of Renata Cambra.

The defendants’ defense, led by Jose Manuel Castro, denies that they are significant authors of the dialogues that motivated the prosecution, countering that “Mario Machado is not the glue that ends everything that is inconvenient.”

As he left the trial, the lawyer also criticized “the very philosophy underlying this process”, believing that “there are not two or three random verdicts, undoubtedly in bad taste” that immediately justify a call for hate crimes or discrimination. .

For his part, García Pereira expressed confidence that the evidence presented at trial would confirm that the statements in question were made by the defendants, adding that there had been “a certain trivialization of evil.”

“It’s one thing when people have different or even very different political ideas. Another thing is this logic of appealing to hatred, inciting hatred, attacks on another person simply because he is a woman, because he is a gypsy, because he is a Muslim, because this is different (…), which is completely unacceptable in a minimally democratic society based on respect for the rights of citizens”