Portugal’s Supremo Tribunal de Justiça has sentenced retired senior judge Manuel Mota Botelho, a native of Lagoa, São Miguel Island, to five years in prison, suspended for the same period, after convicting him of nine counts of using minors for prostitution.

The ruling, reported by Açoriano Oriental, stems from offenses committed between 2019 and 2023 involving youths institutionalized at the Santa Casa da Misericórdia da Lagoa, on São Miguel Island. The court found that the 73-year-old defendant exploited the victims’ socioeconomic vulnerability, luring them with rides and paying €25 for each sexual act.

Reading the decision, Supreme Court Justice Ana Paramés highlighted what she described as the defendant’s “distorted personality,” stressing that the positions of trust and prestige he held—namely at the Tribunal de Contas—should have constituted an ethical barrier to such conduct. The case was brought to the authorities after staff at the institution noticed the minors possessed goods inconsistent with their incomes.

Although Botelho was acquitted of seven of the 16 original charges, the court concluded that evidence proved an intent to exploit vulnerable minors. The suspended sentence was justified by the defendant’s age but made conditional on several measures: payment of compensation to the three victims, participation in a psychotherapeutic program aimed at preventing sexual abuse, and the inclusion of his DNA in Portugal’s national database of sexual offenders.

According to SIC Notícias, the case that led to Thursday’s conviction originated from a mobile phone wiretap in a separate investigation.

In Diário da Lagoa, Clife Botelho, director

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