Public Prosecutor's Office

The Public Prosecutor's Office (Portuguese: Ministério Público, lit. "Public Ministry", also usually referred as "MP") is the Brazilian body of independent public prosecutors at both the federal (Ministério Público da União) and state level (Ministério Público Estadual). It operates independently from the three branches of government and was referred to by Constitutional scholar Michel Temer as the "Fourth Branch". However, nowadays Brazil is ironically said to have "Eight Branches" or powers, for the Constitution of 1988 split many of the original functions of the Public Prosecutor's Office into three different bodies: the Public Procurator's Office, the Public Defender's Office and the Public Prosecutor's Office itself, each one of them an independent body. In addition to that, the new Constitution created the Courts of Account, which are also independent.

There are three levels of public prosecutors, according to the jurisdiction of the courts before which they perform their duties. There are the federal prosecutors (procuradores da República) who bring cases before judges in lower courts; the appellate federal prosecutors (Procuradores Regionais da República); and the superior federal prosecutors (Subprocuradores Gerais da República). The Prosecutor General (Procurador Geral da República) heads the federal body and brings cases before the Supreme Federal Court, which handles final judicial reviews and criminal offenses committed by federal legislators, members of the cabinet, and the President of Brazil. At the state level, the body usually has three divisions: substitute state prosecutors (Promotores de Justiça Substitutos); state prosecutors before the lower courts (Promotores de Justiça Titulares); and appellate state prosecutors (Procuradores de Justiça). There are also military prosecutors (Promotores Militares) whose duties are related to State Military Police Corps and Military Firefighther Corps.

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