Messages obtained by Brazil's Federal Police show that federal lawmaker Cezinha de Madureira, of the PL party, told associates he had direct access to Justice Kassio Nunes Marques of the STF, Brazil's Supreme Federal Court, and that he would make requests in cases assigned to the justice. The exchanges appear in a ruling by Justice Flávio Dino that authorized searches targeting the congressman on Monday (14). According to the Painel column of Folha de S.Paulo, the police report links the lawmaker's actions to Nunes Marques in two cases before the court, with fees of 1 million reais cited in the ruling.
The two cases
One case involved Denis de Souza Macedo, a former education secretary of Belford Roxo, in Rio de Janeiro state, arrested in 2025 in an operation that investigated the diversion of 112 million reais from Fundeb and PNAE, two federal education funding programs, according to CNN Brasil. The contract set fees of 1 million reais plus another 2 million reais in case of success, defined as "the granting of the CLIENT's release". The other case concerned an attempt by the then mayor of Beberibe, in Ceará state, Michele Cariello de Sá Queiroz Rocha, to challenge an investigation by the Ceará state prosecutors; a payment of 500,000 reais was tied to the ruling on her claim at the STF.
In one exchange cited by investigators, Chamber of Deputies staffer Mariângela Fialek, a former aide to lawmaker Arthur Lira, asks: "Will you be with Justice Kassio at 4?". Cezinha replies that the justice had scheduled a video call for 4pm. "I had asked him to see me early today, he could not see me, he scheduled a video call with me at 4:00. Justice Kassio. Understood? Then I will ask him", he wrote. On August 5, 2025, the lawmaker sent Fialek a one-time-view image and wrote: "I already spoke". She replied: "Cezinha, and there is the Rio one". According to the ruling, the message most likely referred to Macedo's case. The congressman is under investigation for suspected exploitation of prestige, influence peddling, passive corruption and money laundering.
Nunes Marques is not a target
In the justice's reading, the messages show the lawmaker promised more than the forwarding of court filings.
"The expressions 'I will ask him', 'I need to ask expressly' and the naming of the interlocutor ('Justice Kassio') show, in a preliminary assessment, that the lawmaker was not limited to forwarding filings: he committed to making a personal and direct request to the judge, on behalf of parties represented by lawyers linked to him by marriage and by economic interest", Dino wrote.
According to the police report, Fialek brought in the clients and drafted legal briefs; lawyer Valéria Rodrigues Linhares, the lawmaker's wife, drafted and signed the contracts; and Cezinha held "supposed personal and direct contact with justices of the superior courts". In the Federal Police's reading, the two lawyers formed a partnership to "obtain favorable rulings in cases pending at the STF, with the help of Cezinha de Madureira".
Nunes Marques and Justice André Mendonça are not targets of the investigation, Poder360 reports. CNN Brasil and Poder360 contacted the offices of both justices and had received no reply by publication time. The inquiry also examines the suspected sale of influence in references to the solicitor general, Jorge Messias, whom President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva nominated for an STF seat; the AGU, the government's legal office, said the lawmaker's support for the nomination "did not imply any interference, participation or intrusion" by him in the process. Dino also took over a separate investigation that seized 510,000 reais in cash from a relative of Cezinha at Congonhas airport in São Paulo. The inquiry remains under Dino at the STF while the Federal Police reviews the material seized in Monday's searches.