The April 2026 Inspection Report on Portugal's Central Department of Investigation and Penal Action (DCIAP) revealed serious operational flaws and "chaotic" conditions, shouting against investigations often lack objective management, with cases remaining open for excessive periods while waiting for new elements to emerge based solely on thin suspicions, whether the initial or other different. As a result, processes are being stalled for years, exceeding legal time limits. The damning report led to the Attorney General Amadeu Guerra being summoned to Parliament.

Not everyone paid attention to an important interview that took place on December 17th in which the current director of the DCIAP Rui Miguel Pereira Cardoso, declared on Portuguese public television that an investigation is not opened arbitrarily. Commissioned and abstract newspaper reports, nor generic anonymous denunciations, are sufficient: "Speculation is not a crime report - he said - and cannot lead to the opening of an investigation. If we do not receive a crime report, that is, if what we receive is a set of poorly defined and unclear accusations, if we are receiving many denunciations from identified and unidentified people, but they never bring a real crime report, if the report of concrete facts that constitute a crime is only speculation, it is necessary to take into account that speculation is not a crime report and therefore legally cannot imply the opening of an investigation."

Cardoso continued vehemently: "There are abstract accusations that are intended to instrumentalize the Public Prosecutor's Office. We receive many accusations that are merely to raise doubts, and we immediately see that these accusations have the sole purpose of opening an investigation, the instrumentalization of the Public Prosecutor's Office for political, economic, or revenge purposes."

EJA Board Member supports Cardoso

Gabriel Senderowicz, the President of the Jewish Community of Porto and Board Member of European jewish Association, has no doubts: "With Cardoso, a new era begins. We are certain that at this moment Cardoso's DCIAP is taking care to ascertain the nature of the accusers, their criminal record, their psychiatric record, and their intentions. It is not difficult to do this; it is enough to imitate what the Inquisition itself began to do in the regulations of 1774."

Senderowicz remembers hearing about DCIAP almost five years ago. "Following a fake news story that suited the government, the lady who was minister of Justice sent the information to the DCIAP along with anonymous letters from a convicted criminal. It then happened that one of the largest synagogues in Europe was illegally raided under the pretext of "corruption of registry offices"—which is technically impossible, as our nomenclature doesn't recognize a single register office. Another pathetic allegation was that the community had certified Patrick Drahi and Roman Abramovich in exchange for large sums of money, when in fact nobody here knew Drahi and the 250 euros from Abel Leiva da Rocha were donated to the registry office to buy umbrellas."

The President of the Community makes a prediction: "I see Cardoso here with us celebrating the European Day of Jewish Culture in 2027. It's an excellent event. For now, I see him with his hands on his head, because he knows that his predecessor, Albano Pinto, opened a specific case without any report of a crime, searched a synagogue without any report of a crime, seized millions of documents and communications without any report of a crime, invented defendants without any report of a crime, and in general we can say he made a mockery of the state and the separation of powers!"

Priorities are not forgotten by Senderowicz. "We really wanted to know how DCIAP dared to set foot in the synagogue without our permission and, worst, assuming that we knew nothing about Jews of Sephardic origin. The Hamas hostages are not only in our hearts because they were murdered so cruelly. They are also in our hearts because they opened the grave of the DCIAP, which, in our experience, should have already closed its doors a long time ago."

"It is a "folder" mentality, where cases are either archived or shifting entirely away from the initial allegations, as an effort to produce accusations of any kind. The problem is that these strategies are not always possible if, instead of anonymous citizens, we are dealing with a Jewish community and its vast experience in keeping these issues alive for centuries. Jews are not afraid of local political games, especially when these politicians have set up a corrupt system that is easily detectable and, if necessary, destructible. We have already decided to continue to grow, to educate the national youth, and at the same time to contribute to making the justice system more honest and humane with an objective idea of Justice, equity, good faith, and respect for the procedurally valid truth."

The Politicization of DCIAP

Gabriel Senderowicz downplays the suspicions some raise about the politicization of the DCIAP prosecutors: "The case of Orlando Figueira, once convicted of receiving bribes to favor interests in investigations he was conducting regarding Angola, doesn't really tell us anything, as we believe he was a scapegoat. Similarly, the denunciation by Deputy Attorney General Maria José Fernandes – regarding media investigations by the DCIAP conducted in a way that benefited the career advancement of the magistrates involved – is something we downplay, precisely because while the idea may be correct in general, we don't see that this magistrate has ever alleged concrete facts relating to specific cases and specific people."

Senderowicz focuses on a truly valid fact that should be taken into account to make Portugal a more dignified and safe country. “I remember Noronha de Nascimento, the former President of the Portuguese Supreme Court of Justice, warned that criminal investigations can be weaponized with political motivations. He cited the Vistos Gold investigation and has criticized the Public Ministry's actions, suggesting that for a "greater jurisdictionalization" of criminal investigations to protect the judiciary from external pressures, asserting that the current system allows for too much opacity that can be exploited by political power".