Brazilian judge rejects Lynn’s demand to be moved to hospital

Runaway solicitor Michael Lynn has been turned down by a Brazilian judge after begging to be allowed out of jail, because he claims he may have tuberculosis.

He petitioned the country’s Supreme Court to let him be transferred to a hospital, saying a private doctor had diagnosed him with symptoms of the deadly disease. However, Judge Marco Aurélio refused his request, noting that the prison governor had said four public doctors had seen no need for hospitalisation.

The disgraced businessman has now spent nine months fighting extradition in Cotel prison near the city of Recife in north-east Brazil.

Last month, it emerged that the former fugitive, who fled Ireland in 2007 over allegations of an €80m fraud, was taking the matter of his health to court, claiming that prison bosses had unfairly refused to transfer him to a hospital.

Lynn demanded to be transferred to the Real Hospital Português in Recife, one of the most exclusive private hospitals in the region. Initially, a prison doctor diagnosed him with chronic intermittent asthma in April, the court said, but declined to hospitalise him.

Then in a consultation, his private doctor, Paulo Mabesoone, “diagnosed symptoms of tuberculosis and recommended an immediate transfer to the Hospital Português for pathological examination and treatment”.

Lynn said conditions in the prison may have been responsible for his illness. A series of other consultations with different doctors, including a psychiatrist, followed. Two tests for tuberculosis in this period proved negative, according to court papers.

In a submission to the court, which declined Lynn’s bail application in February, prison governor Everardo Luna stressed the “divergence between the private doctor’s report and the reports of four state doctors, who do not indicate the need for hospitalisation” and said it was clear that no hospital treatment was necessary. Judge Marco Aurélio agreed in a judgment dated June 10 and published this week.

The prison, in the industrial outskirts of Recife, has a capacity of 700 but has up to 2,400 inmates.

Lynn fled Ireland seven years ago over allegations of a massive mortgage fraud. He settled in Brazil with his young family, living openly in a villa near a sandy beach while teaching English to the locals, joining a country club, and dabbling in the property market.

Brazil’s Supreme Court is still considering Ireland’s extradition request. While there is no extradition treaty between the two countries, a temporary bilateral agreement was struck which means that Lynn can be extradited, even though he has had a child born in Brazil.