The ruling on 29 August ended a case dating from 1976, during the Brazilian military dictatorship, which had a policy of industrialising the Amazon.
Much of the evidence in the case was gathered by Fr Ricardo Rezende, who at the time was a parish priest in the area and worked with the Church’s Pastoral Land Commission. The case was brought by the provincial Labour Prosecution Service and heard in the town of Redenção.
It accused Volkswagen do Brasil specifically of enticement, debt bondage, and allowing degrading living and working conditions. Three years ago the company admitted the persecution and torture of former staff at its factory in São Bernardo dos Campos in the southern state of São Paulo.
Fr Rezende said the sentence pronounced was “very severe”. The company was ordered to pay 165 million Brazilian reais (£22 million), to publish an apology to the victims and to Brazil, and to design measures to prevent similar crimes being committed again.
In this case, the company argued it was not the legal owner of the ranch, but documents showed it had claimed to be the owner when applying for government grants. It blamed any ill-treatment on sub-contractors. It said it will appeal to a higher court.
Fr Rezende told The Tablet about his work over five decades to bring the company to justice.
Attempts to secure action from the authorities failed, and at the suggestion of the then secretary of the Brazilian bishops’ conference, Mgr Luciano Mendes de Almeida, the conference hosted a press conference in 1983 at which Fr Rezende spoke.
This was the first public denunciation of the company’s actions. This seemed at first to have no effect, though in 1986 Volkswagen sold the ranch.
Fr Rezende said he thought Volkswagen’s appeal would not succeed because Brazil is a signatory to international conventions banning slavery.