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Top Brazil court acquits head of Workers’ Party of graft

June 20, 2018 GMT

FILE- In this July 5, 2017 file photo, Brazil's Workers' Party President Gleisi Hoffmann attends the inauguration ceremony of the new Workers' Party directory in Brasilia, Brazil. Justices on Brazil’s highest court have acquitted, on Wednesday, June 20, 2018, the Workers’ Party president of corruption and money-laundering charges in a case stemming from the country’s massive graft investigation. (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres, File)

SAO PAULO (AP) — Justices on Brazil’s highest court acquitted the Workers’ Party president of corruption and money-laundering charges in a case stemming from the country’s mammoth graft investigation.

Supreme Court justices ruled late Tuesday that prosecutors provided no evidence corroborating the plea-bargain testimony used against Sen. Gleisi Hoffmann. Prosecutors can appeal.

Prosecutors had alleged Hoffmann accepted more than $260,000 in illegal campaign contributions siphoned from contracts of Petrobras, the state-run oil company that is at the center of the “Car Wash” probe that has uncovered billions of dollars in bribes and kickbacks.

Hoffmann said the charges were invented to discredit her party, an allegation she has also made in defending former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the party founder who was convicted of corruption. She said accusations against her came solely from unreliable cooperating witnesses.