Initial reports made a point of agent’s ‘experience’
Four months after he used his service weapon to fatally shoot a man resisting arrest, it transpires that the young PSP agent who killed Odair Moniz – sparking a wave of violence throughout Lisbon – had no specific firearms training.
Reports today reveal that he “never attended any training related to firearms”, beyond the course he underwent in 2022 to become a PSP agent.
The information is contained in a file that was sent by the PSP’s human resources centre to public prosecutors at Lisbon ‘s Department of Investigation and Penal Action (DIAP) – long after the initial PSP statements suggesting the agent was ‘experienced’.
That experience has now been shown to be less than two years (he first joined the ranks of the PSP in November 2022).
According to the file consulted by Lusa news agency, the agent now facing prosecution for murder began his police training in December 2021, finishing in September 2022.
It was in September 2022 that he took part in what was his “last shooting record”, at the Practical Police School in Torres Novas.
In other words, the young man had not drawn his service weapon during his time as an acting police agent until the moment he shot and killed Odair Moniz, in Cova da Moura, in the early hours of October 21, 2024.
In his first interrogation by PJ judicial police, the agent said that, in addition to firing two shots in the air, he fired two in Moniz’s direction, but tried to direct the gun downwards to avoid killing him. But in the PSP report, which was sent to the Public Prosecution Service, the officer said he fired twice at Moniz in the direction of his waistline ‘only with the aim of neutralising him’, recalls Lusa.
The Public Prosecution Service revealed in its charge sheet last week that the first shot was fired at a distance of between 20 and 50 centimetres from the victim, and hit him in the chest area. At the time, Moniz “remained standing” and the PSP officer then fired a second time, from a distance of between 75 centimetres and one metre, hitting him in the groin area.
In addition to the criminal investigation, disciplinary proceedings involving the officer are underway at the Inspectorate-General for Internal Administration (IGAI) and the PSP. IGAI has told Lusa that its case is still in the investigation phase and subject to judicial secrecy.
IGAI has also said that it asked the Public Prosecution Service twice last year for access to witness statements, expert reports and viewing records, but authorisation was only given once charges were brought, as the criminal case was covered by judicial secrecy.
On the PSP side, the national director of the PSP said yesterday that all clarifications will be provided about the preparation of the police report on the death of Moniz, stating that the force’s strategic information system “records everything”.
In its investigation, the PJ found that the PSP report sent to the Public Prosecution Service may not have been drawn up by the agent, who appears to have signed it while he was being questioned elsewhere..
In the PSP report, the officer says that Moniz had a bladed weapon in his hand and tried to hit him over the head. However, when he made his first statements to the PJ, there was no mention of an attempted assault. The agent only mentioned having seen an object similar to a knife in one of the bags Moniz was wearing around his waist, and that Moniz had tried to reach for it.
The Public Prosecution Service has since ordered the extraction of a certificate for a separate investigation into the alleged falsification of the PSP police report.
natasha.donn@portugalresident.com
Source material: LUSA
