A lawyer standing trial in Portugal’s long-running Operation Marquês confirmed on Tuesday, 19th May, that he delivered €10,000 to the former driver of ex-prime minister José Sócrates at the request of businessman Carlos Santos Silva, whilst insisting he never believed he was committing a crime.
Gonçalo Trindade Ferreira, 50, told the court in Lisbon that he had worked more than a decade ago for a company linked to Santos Silva, whom prosecutors describe as an alleged frontman for the former Socialist leader, and faces three counts of money laundering.
Two of the charges relate to legal work connected to property purchases in the Greater Lisbon area and in Paris, transactions prosecutors claim were used to channel funds to Sócrates. A third concerns €200,000 allegedly stored in a bank safe deposit box.
Giving evidence during the trial, the lawyer acknowledged the existence of the safe deposit box but maintained the money belonged solely to Santos Silva and served as a contingency fund for company expenses.
“This amount was not delivered all at once,” he told the court, explaining that the funds were assembled shortly before the collapse of Banco Espírito Santo, when the businessman’s companies were operating projects across Brazil, Algeria and Venezuela.
According to Trindade Ferreira, Santos Silva asked him to safeguard part of the money because of his close contact with employees and operational matters.
The lawyer admitted that, on one occasion, he handed an envelope containing €10,000 to João Perna, then employed as Sócrates’ driver, despite having no professional relationship with him.
“The only time money came into my hands was €10,000 for João Perna,” he said, adding that he had not been told what the envelope contained when it was entrusted to him.
He further stated that between 2005 and 2011 he also delivered envelopes to Sofia Fava, the former prime minister’s ex-wife, believing they contained documentation rather than cash.
Prosecutors argue that the sums in question in fact belonged to Sócrates and derived from corrupt payments, an allegation denied by the defendants.
Trindade Ferreira insisted that his involvement in property transactions in Lisbon and Paris fell entirely within his professional duties as a lawyer. This included drafting a backdated rental agreement for a Paris apartment listing Santos Silva as landlord and Sócrates as tenant.
“At no moment did I feel I was committing anything improper. I was fulfilling my duty,” he told judges, adding that he had only met Sócrates on the eve of the former prime minister’s arrest in November 2014 and had been “young” and impressed by the opportunity to travel to Paris for work.
Sócrates, now 68, Santos Silva, Perna, Fava, and Trindade Ferreira are among 21 defendants facing a combined total of 117 alleged economic and financial crimes, most of which they deny.
The former prime minister is accused, among other offences, of three counts of corruption linked to alleged benefits granted to business interests including the Lena Group, the Espírito Santo Group, and the Algarve resort of Vale do Lobo.
The trial began on 3rd July 2025 at Lisbon’s Central Criminal Court and concerns alleged offences committed between 2005 and 2014, in what remains one of the most complex and politically sensitive judicial proceedings in Portugal’s democratic era.
Source: LUSA
