With an eye on procedural economy, judge Toru Yamamoto, from the rd Federal Criminal Court of São Paulo, applied the principle of insignificance to bar the continuation of a police investigation. He applied the understanding of the Federal Supreme Court, that the principle of insignificance applies to crimes of embezzlement with a value of tax due less than R$ thousand, and ordered the shelving of an investigation against businessmen indicted for importing electronic products, without paying the due taxes. import. The judge highlighted that there is no just cause to continue the investigation due to the value of the seized property: R$,
Embezzlement is a crime provided for in article of the Penal Code. It consists of failing to pay tax due for import, export or consumption of merchandise. In this specific case, seven DVD players valued at R$, were Austria Phone Numbers List seized. In the civil sphere, the Federal Revenue paid attention to the jurisprudential understanding of the trifle principle and chose not to file a tax foreclosure, but, in the criminal area, it took the case to the Police.
In an opinion, the Public Prosecutor's Office recognized just cause in opening the police investigation. However, due to the low value of the confiscated products, he decided to archive the files, based on the principle of insignificance.
When analyzing the request, the judge accepted the MP's opinion. Judge Toru Yamamoto highlighted that the value is much lower than that understood as the limit for applying the trifle principle in fiscak execution, provided for by Law ,/, which is R$ thousand. “Therefore, as the continuation of the investigation is ineffective, I consider the archiving to be appropriate.”