Duarte Lima stays silent at Sintra murder trial as key witness cannot be found

The first session

Former PSD parliamentarian Duarte Lima went on trial at the Sintra court on Thursday, 5 November 2026, charged with the homicide of a 74-year-old widow in December 2009. The session was scheduled to start at 14:00. When presiding judge Carlos Camacho asked whether he wanted to make a statement about the killing, Lima declined, saying he would not speak for now on his lawyer's advice.

“For now, and on my lawyer's advice, I will not make a statement.”

Before the session, his lawyer João Barroso Neto argued that the case had been decided in the public square before reaching the court. He called the prosecution's account 'pure fiction' and said the defendant did not have to prove where he was at a given time.

Missing witness

The court was also due to hear a friend of the victim who was among the first to flag her disappearance, but it could not reach her in Brazil. Judge Carlos Camacho said the court had no news that she was alive, and he acknowledged that she may already have died.

“For now, we have no news that she is alive.”

Camacho also cited 'some difficulties' in locating witnesses, both through international cooperation and in direct contact with Brazilian authorities. The defence has added a medical certificate to the case file.

The prosecution's account

Prosecutors say the motive was a transfer of 5.2 million euros from the victim to a bank account of Lima. According to the indictment, Lima wanted the widow to sign a document confirming that the money was in fact his. Prosecutors allege she refused, and that he then killed her. She was shot twice in Maricá, near Rio de Janeiro, in December 2009, and her body was found the next day on a dirt road in Saquarema, about 100 kilometres from Rio.

Lima has argued for years that the sums were fees owed for long years of services to the victim. The businessman's daughter disputes that version, claiming the money was diverted from accounts that belonged to her father. She filed a breach-of-trust complaint against Lima, and he was acquitted of that charge in 2019.

Limitation dispute and delays

Lima's defence argues that the homicide charge is time-barred under the statute of limitations. The judge agreed to examine the point but said Lima had miscalculated, because under Brazilian law the years he spent in prison must be deducted from the limitation period. Lima has already served a prison term for a different crime.

The trial was first planned for November 2022 and was postponed several times, first because witnesses in Brazil had not been notified and later because recordings were missing. The opening session comes almost 17 years after the killing.

What comes next

Barroso Neto said the defence would say everything it has to say in court. The defendant has said he will not testify for now, so his position at the trial remains open. The hearing of one witness was also on the agenda for the first day, and the court's difficulties in reaching witnesses in Brazil are likely to shape the schedule of the remaining sessions.