Neymar gets habeas corpus and avoids tax evasion charges in Brazil

The Paris Saint-Germain forward Neymar has obtained a habeas corpus in a Brazilian court which prevents him from being "prosecuted or arrested" for tax evasion in his country, in the context of two tax actions, according to his legal team.

The Federal Regional Court of the 3rd Region of Brazil has determined the suspension of a "criminal investigative procedure" in which the Prosecutor's Office proposed an agreement to avoid putting him on trial. However, the court considered that there is not enough evidence for the Public Ministry to offer an agreement.

"It would be markedly authoritarian to threaten with Criminal Law someone who exercises their elementary constitutional right to pay everything when due, but only when due," argued the footballer's defense in a statement, represented by the Davi Tangerino Advogados law firm.

This case is not related to the trial that the Brazilian national team star will face in Spain next October, one month before the start of the Qatar World Cup, for alleged irregularities in his transfer to Barcelona in 2013.

In the Brazilian case, Neymar is accused of tax evasion for not declaring correctly and therefore not paying the corresponding taxes referring to payments he and his family received from Barcelona between 2011 and 2013, when he was still a player for Santos.

The Brazilian tax authorities imposed a fine of 188 million reals (today about 36 million dollars) which the footballer managed to considerably reduce through a series of resources in judicial instances.

In May 2020, he also obtained a precautionary measure that allowed him to suspend the payment of the fine until the case was judged.

Neymar's defense argues that a large part of the money demanded by the Brazilian authorities was paid in Spain, while he defended Barcelona's colors, through the payment of taxes in that country, the values of which should be deducted from the fine.

After the habeas corpus, his lawyers insisted that there is no "minimum certainty about the existence of a criminal act", nor "the possibility that the Federal Public Ministry seeks a conviction" or has an "interest in acting".

"Those conditions must be present when a agreement of non-prosecution is offered, since the agreement is an alternative to the filing of a complaint," argued Neymar's lawyers, a thesis accepted by the Brazilian Justice.

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