"To this day, May 20, 2024, he has not been notified of the indictment [by the Public Prosecutor's Office]. The maximum duration of the preventive detention measure [one year] has expired", the document states.

In this sense, the defense of the businessman understands that "it is necessary to immediately restore the defendant to freedom".

After being present at the first judicial interrogation, the Porto TIC determined, on May 19, 2023, that the vice-president of the Gaia City Council at the time of the facts, Patrocínio Azevedo, and the businessman Paulo Malafaia would both be held in preventive detention.

Elad Dror, an Israeli businessman and at the time of the facts CEO of the Fortera Group, was released, but had to pay a bail of one million euros and surrender his passport, while lawyer João Lopes was left with the measure of house arrest.

A fifth defendant, Amândio Dias, was forced to suspend his duties as a senior technician at the Regional Directorate of Culture of the North.

The five defendants were also prohibited from contacting each other and with defendants to be constituted.

The investigation by the Public Prosecutor's Office (MP) in the main process of Operation Babel believes that Elad Dror and the real estate businessman Paulo Malafaia, through lawyer João Lopes, handed over more than 120 thousand euros to the then vice-president of the City Council of Vila Nova de Gaia, Patrocínio Azevedo (PS), so that he would decide in favor of his urban interests.

The investigation argues that Elad Dror, founder of the Fortera group, with Israeli capital, and Paulo Malafaia, real estate developer, "agreed to develop real estate projects in the city of Vila Nova de Gaia, namely the so-called Skyline/Cultural and Congress Center, Riverside and Hotel Azul", according to a dispatch from the Porto Regional DIAP, which Lusa had previously accessed.

In a statement released on May 16, 2023, the day of the arrest of these four defendants, the Judicial Police (PJ) explained that "Operation Babel focuses on the distortion of norms and instruction of urban licensing processes in favor of promoters associated with projects of high density and magnitude, with real estate interests in the order of 300 million euros being at stake, through the offer and acceptance of financial compensation".

The main process of Operation Babel involves crimes of improper receipt or offer of advantage, active and passive corruption, prevarication and abuse of power, practiced by and on a civil servant or holder of political office.

Read Also: Young man suspected of killing his father in Peniche is tried in the Leiria Court (Portuguese version)

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