The complaint, relating to the contents of an interview Alexandre gave to the television broadcaster SIC on 7 September, was received on 27 September, but the CSM decided that it would only analyse it after the Lisbon appeal court had ruled on an application by Sócrates’s lawyers to have Alexandre taken off the case. That request was turned down this week.
“Given that the recusal issue was decided on 11 October, it was decided to start the corresponding inquiry procedure,” the CSM said in a statement on Thursday, adding that “it is in the ambit of this inquiry proceeding that the Council will in time appreciate all the questions raised by the interview in question.”
The CSM is the body that manages and disciplines Portugal’s judges.
On 27 September, in a one-paragraph statement, the CSM announced that it had received that same day a complaint from Sócrates against Alexandre, who is based at the Central Court of Criminal Instruction, “on the content of which the CSM does not comment and which will follow its normal course”.
In the SIC interview, Alexandre said, among other things, that he felt he was being eavesdropped on in his daily life, that he is not rich, nor does he have rich friends.
Sócrates is one of 18 suspects in ‘Operation Marquês’, a criminal inquiry into alleged money laundering, tax fraud and receiving bribes, with media reports indicating that prosecutors are investigating indications that money that was nominally that of friends may actually have been his. He denies the allegations.
Sócrates was in prison on remand for more than nine months, after his detention at Lisbon airport in November 2014. He was subsequently transferred to house arrest and then, in October last year, released while the inquiry continues. No charges have yet been laid.