Camarote Gate: Defence gets 5 days to answer audio report request | OneFootball

The São Paulo Ethics Committee has given the two former club directors accused of illegally selling a box at Morumbi Stadium for the Colombian singer Shakira’s concert in March last year five days to prepare their defense regarding the incident.

This was the initial decision made by the committee on Monday night (23), following a meeting investigating whether there were any irregularities that violated the club’s Statute.

One of the accused, former youth director Douglas Schwartzmann, claimed that he had not yet had access to the full original audio, and especially to the report issued during the day that confirmed the authenticity of the recording (read more below).

The information was first revealed by the portal ‘Tricolor na Web‘ and confirmed to AVANTE MEU TRICOLOR by sources within São Paulo’s leadership. The report found that one of Douglas’s defense tactics would be to question the authenticity of the recorded conversation in which he and Mara Casares are heard negotiating the box, which would be illegal. The case is also being investigated by the Civil Police and the State Public Prosecutor’s Office.

After this alternative became unfeasible due to the independently conducted forensic analysis, the justification was that they needed to better understand what the document indicated. The Ethics Committee found the request plausible, as it is a new piece of evidence in the process.

It is important to note that the doubt regarding the legality of the main evidence supporting the case had already been clarified by the other accused.

Former female, cultural, and events director of the social club, Mara, who even resigned from her position as councilor, cried during her testimony after confirming that yes, the conversations leaked by the press were indeed legitimate.

As part of the internal Ethics procedures, São Paulo’s marketing executive Eduardo Toni and another employee from his department testified as witnesses and confirmed that the controversial box is for the exclusive use of the club and could not be sold.

Parallel to the police investigation, a group of São Paulo councilors commissioned a forensic analysis to assess the integrity of the audio that led to the removal of Schwartzmann and Mara. The report concluded that the material is intact and shows no signs of editing or digital manipulation.

Two technical reports were produced. The first, prepared by a speech therapist expert, analyzed the quality and acoustic integrity, considering factors such as noise, overlapping voices, and signal-to-noise ratio. The second examined metadata and conducted a spectrographic analysis to check for possible digital tampering.

In both, the results indicated no manipulation. In one section of the report, the expert states that “the material is intact, with no signs of any kind of manipulation.”

In practice, with the extended deadline for the duo’s defense, the committee’s final opinion on the case may take up to 30 days to be concluded. And the punishments involve more internal bureaucracy. Because Douglas is a lifetime councilor, his situation is complex. In this condition, sanctions such as censure or suspension are legally viable within the disciplinary sphere, while a possible loss of mandate would depend on a vote in the Deliberative Council.

Mara, on the other hand, resigned from her elected councilor position in December, amid the fallout from the case. Even so, the process may continue if the committee understands that the facts occurred while she was performing statutory functions. In this scenario, the penalties could have a symbolic effect or impact her future eligibility, depending on the interpretation of the scope of the sanctions provided for.

As AVANTE MEU TRICOLOR found out this Sunday (22), the tendency is that this is exactly what will happen. Pressured by fans and members, who even held a ‘pizza party’ inside the club as a form of protest (recall by clicking here), even members of the committee close to the duo have been announcing votes in favor of expulsion.

Of the five members of the committee, three have already publicly stated they support punishing Douglas and Mara.

The opposition councilors of former president Julio Casares are pushing for the maximum penalty, that is, expulsion from the club. There is concern that the ‘pizza’ in this case will result in only mild penalties.

“We are paying close attention. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s something just for show. It’s D-Day for São Paulo’s morality,” said a councilor interviewed by the report.

THE ACCUSED

Mara is no longer part of São Paulo’s political life. In addition to her events director position, she also gave up her seat on the Deliberative Council. Schwartzmann, former youth director, left his administrative role but remained as a councilor.

The ex-wife of former president Julio Casares is the one facing the most problems with the police investigations. At the end of last month, a notebook seized at the home of Rita de Cássia Adriana Prado, one of the main figures in the scandal, gave new directions to the authorities.

Although the content is under seal, investigators indicate that the notes would help detail how the scheme worked and suggest that at least one São Paulo box was systematically diverted.

The operation was conducted by the 3rd Police Department for Investigations into Criminal Dismantling (Dicca) and also targeted Schwartzmann, former deputy director of the youth categories, and Mara Casares, ex-wife of former president Júlio Casares and then female, cultural, and events director.

The seized notebook would provide more elements about the mechanism that supported the scheme, which may have lasted longer than initially thought. “The documents collected allow us to see the seriousness and extent of the facts, including the time frame, which is much longer than previously imagined,” said prosecutor José Reinaldo Carneiro Guimarães, stressing that the investigation is not yet complete.

At Mara’s residence, police also seized R$28,000 in cash and a computer, in addition to documents considered important for the investigation’s progress. In a statement, São Paulo declared that “it is a victim in this case and will cooperate with the authorities in the investigation.”

Meanwhile, the newspaper ‘O Estado de S. Paulo‘ found that the business dealings involving Adriana and Mara at the club had been going on since at least 2023.

Currently on leave from the board, Mara is said to have partnered with Adriana in brokering the sale of spaces and tickets for games and concerts at Morumbi, as well as other São Paulo events.

Mara’s defense claims that she is fully cooperating with the authorities and that the integrity of her actions will be proven.

The timeline drawn by police and the Public Prosecutor’s Office indicates that the joint activity of the two was not limited to box 3A at Shakira’s concert, mentioned in the audio released in December.

Sources interviewed by the newspaper report Adriana’s presence as an intermediary as early as 2022. Adriana herself has exchanges of messages and emails with club directors and is said to have approached Casares’s opponents to negotiate the material.

THE CASE

Mara was caught together with Schwartzmann in a controversy over the transfer of a space at the Tricolor stadium for a concert by Colombian singer Shakira in March. Both were caught in phone recordings made by the whistleblower, who felt wronged after claiming she had been “robbed” by a fourth party involved.

Mara’s leave, however, came at an opportune moment for the Casares administration. It happened a day after the approval of São Paulo’s budget for 2026, in which she voted to approve the accounts proposed by her ex-husband.

Although now on leave, Mara will continue to be investigated in the case on two fronts.

First, she will be the subject of a police inquiry initiated at the request of the São Paulo State Public Prosecutor’s Office.

Prosecutor José Reinaldo Guimarães Carneiro, from the MP-SP’s Tourism and Sports Commission, saw clear evidence of crimes involving São Paulo, not just in the consumer relationship among the other parties involved.

“The first crime is private corruption in sports, which is a crime under the new General Sports Law, in force since 2023. This crime, in fact, presupposes the manipulation of private interests to the detriment of the club’s assets, of the associations,” said Carneiro.

“And a second crime, which is also very serious, is coercion during the process. Because calling someone and intimidating them to withdraw a lawsuit under the threat of repercussions, as the recordings suggest, is an indication of a crime,” the prosecutor added.

The Public Prosecutor’s suggestion is that all three people involved in the audio (Douglas Schwartzmann, Mara Casares, and the whistleblower) and all those mentioned, including Marcio Carlomagno, São Paulo’s general superintendent, be heard.

“All the money collected by an association, whether in a sports arena due to football or another sporting activity, must revert to the club. Not to benefit the private interests of those who should be managing the club. The police will take the next steps,” he said.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇧🇷 here.