Background
Romes Aniceto de Freitas filed a special appeal alleging violations of Articles 98 and 99(2) of Brazil’s 2015 Code of Civil Procedure. The lower court refused to admit that appeal based on Federal Supreme Court Precedent No. 283.
Freitas then filed an appeal to the Superior Court of Justice but did not address that specific ground for inadmissibility. The STJ’s President therefore declined to consider the appeal. Freitas sought internal review, asserting that he had specifically challenged the inadmissibility ruling and again presenting his arguments on the merits. Banco do Nordeste do Brasil S.A. opposed the internal appeal.
The Court’s Holding
The Fourth Panel unanimously denied the internal appeal and left the President’s ruling in place. It held that an appeal seeking to overturn the refusal to admit a special appeal must specifically challenge every ground supporting the refusal. Repeating arguments about the underlying merits does not satisfy that requirement.
The court explained that the principle of appellate dialectics requires an appellant to show why the challenged decision is procedurally or substantively wrong. Because Freitas did not contest the application of Federal Supreme Court Precedent No. 283 in his appeal to the STJ, Article 932(III) of the 2015 Code of Civil Procedure and Article 253, sole paragraph, item I, of the STJ’s Internal Rules required nonconsideration of the appeal. The later internal appeal could not cure the omission made at the preceding appellate stage.
Key Takeaways
- An appeal against the denial of a special appeal must specifically address every ground for inadmissibility, whether or not the grounds are independent.
- Merely repeating the underlying merits does not overcome an unchallenged procedural bar.
- An internal appeal cannot cure a failure to make the required specific challenge in the earlier appeal.
Why It Matters
The decision reinforces the STJ’s strict preservation and briefing requirements. Parties seeking STJ review must engage directly and in detail with each reason the lower court gave for refusing a special appeal; otherwise, the STJ may reject the appeal without reaching its merits.