From the PR Newswire: “Brazil Originates Derivatives”

PR Newswire Brasil has not quite taken off yet — it has not yet signed up a critical mass of businesses to make the thing worth following with great attention — but the attempt to port the service down South America Way is interesting, and probably ought to catch on eventually.

I have actually met some folks trying to get it off the ground here, in combination with promoting a “culture of disclosure” for Brazilian businesses, and I can sincerely say: It seems like a good idea.

Here, at any rate, is an event that I will very likely try to attend, if they let me in. (There is a big venture capital event in Rio earlier in the month I also want to attend.)

A indústria brasileira de fundos de derivativos alcança o ponto de virada

Brazilian derivatives fund industry reaches a turning point.

I was just starting to get that impression myself, even if “turning point” — revolution, apocalypse — is the most frequently abused metaphor in postmodern PR.

This, even as an interesting commentary appeared the other day according to which the unevolved state of complex financial contracts here deserve credit for shielding Brazil from the effects of the subprime crisis.

See

BN003644 01 de abril de 2008 10:29 HORALOCAL

US$127 bls e crescendo

US$127 billion and growing

NOVA YORK, 1 de abril de 2008 /PRNewswire/ — O Mercado brasileiro de fundos de derivativos manteve um crescimento exponencial na última década. Desde dezembro de 2000, a indústria cresceu um 1.020% extraordinária, alcançando US$127 bilhões de ativos sob gestão. Enquanto os fundos de derivativos sobressaem sobre outros tipos de fundos de derivativos internacionais, o mundo presta atenção.

The Brazilian derivatives fund market has grown exponentially during the current decade. Since December 2000, the industry has grown at the extraordinary rate of 1,020%, attaining US$127 billion in assets under management. And as [Brazilian] derivatives funds pass by other types of international derivatives funds, the world is starting to sit up and pay attention.

Mais de 300 profissionais de fundos de derivativos irão chegar a São Paulo de 28 a 30 de abril no Alternative Investment Summit Brasil — o primeiro congresso de fundos de derivativos do país. Palestrantes notáveis incluindo o presidente do Banco Central, Henrique Meirelles, o presidente e diretor-executivo da Marathon Asset Management, Bruce Richards, e o sócio-fundador da Mauá Investimentos, Luiz Fernando Figueiredo.

More than 300 professionals from derivatives funds will be in São Paulo from April 28 to April 30 for the Alternative Investment Summit Brazil — the first derivative funds congress in the nation. Notable speakers including Central Bank president Meirelles, president and CEO of Marathon Asset Management Bruce Richards, and founding partner of Mauá Investiments, Luiz Fernando Figueiredo.

Esse evento está programado para ajudar os investidores brasileiros e internacionais a pilotar nesse próspero mercado. O congresso irá unir gestores de fundos de derivativos, investidores, reguladores e economistas para discutir os seguintes assuntos:

The event is designed to help Brazilian and international investors navigate this prosperous market. It will bring together fund managers, investors, regulators and economists to discuss the following topics:

Mamulengos

Howdy Doody thumbs a ride from Robert Wilson in the caatinga: mamulengo theater is part ventriloquist act, part Carnaval parade, part religious procession. (Not shown above is Ventoforte; these popular theater forms are widely cultivated.)

Neuza takes me to see an (unscheduled supplementary) technical rehearsal of “[If This World Were So Great, The Owner of It Would Live Here, Too]” at the Teatro Ventoforte, based on a story or play, not sure which, by Ariano Suassuna.

(We saw a bigger-budget production of his A Pedra do Reino directed by Antunes Filho and staged by the Teatro Macunaima last year, I think it was, at SESC Santana. Suassuna was feted by Rio carnival society this year, I think. Or was it in Sampa?)

Over there in Itaím Bibi.

It was a lovely, lovely way to spend the evening.

Later, we eat a huge, smoking chunk of lovingly charred, pampas-style, cow with a deeply melancholy Malbec at Martin Fierro in the Vila Madelena, where, contrary to the general tendency of the neighborhood, things are quiet and civilized and the waiters wear white smocks, like barbers and 19th-century doctors.

A local culture-vulture blog, in brief:

Pioneiro do teatro popular em São Paulo, o grupo Ventoforte estréia hoje (dia 29) “Se o Mundo Fosse Bom, o Dono Morava Nele”, em seu próprio espaço. O espetáculo é inspirado em “A Pena e a Lei”, de Ariano Suassuna, e tem prólogo e epílogo escritos por Ilo Krugli, que também assina a direção.

A pioneer of popular theater in São Paulo, Ventoforte opens a new production today [February 29] of “If the World Were a Good Place, the Owner Would Live There,” in its own space. The show is inspired by [“crime and punishment”] by Ariano Suassuna, with a prologue and epilogue by Ilo Krugli, who also directs.

Brokerage and Jokerage on the Overnight Flight to Miami

Mug shot of Charles Ponzi, 1920.

Brasil e EUA deflagram operação para combater fraudes no mercado financeiro: The Brazilian feds and the FBI cooperate to bust Brazilian “ghost firms” set up to swindle little old ladies from Pasadena. The Agência Brasil has the story.

Agentes da Polícia Federal (PF) foram mobilizados hoje (25) para desmontar a ação de uma quadrilha que teria obtido a soma de US$ 50 milhões em crimes financeiros contra investidores estrangeiros. Os fraudadores lesaram pessoas físicas e jurídicas de diversos países, principalmente da Inglaterra, Espanha, Austrália, Estados Unidos e alguns países da Ásia, conforme nota distribuída à imprensa pela Polícia Federal.

The Brazilian federal police were mobilized today (February 25) against a criminal organization that had committed an estimated US$50 million in financial crimes against foreign investors. The fraudsters victimized both individual and institutional investors from English, Spain, Australia, the United States, and various Asian nations, according to a press release from [the Tupi feds] today.

A operação, denominada Pirita, foi montada em conjunto com FBI (sigla em inglês para Departamento Federal de Investigação), que cumpriu dois mandados de prisão contra brasileiros, em Miami. No Brasil, a ação ocorre em nos estados de São Paulo e Rio Grande do Sul, onde deverão ser cumpridos 27 mandados de prisão temporária, três mandados de prisão preventiva e 35 ordens de busca e apreensão.

The operation, nicknamed “Pyrite,” was conducted jointly with the FBI, which served two arrest warrants on Brazilian citizens in Miami. In Brazil, the operation is being conducted in São Paulo and Rio Grande do Sul, where 27 temporary arrest warrants, 3 preventive detention warrants, and 35 search warrants are being served.

Wilson Gets Away: Bad Night at the Bingo

Jumping-off point for the bus to Santos: Jabaquara, Southern Zone.

The Military Police reported that all squad cars were called in to assist in the search for Oliveira, and therefore no car went to the warehouse where the illegal [gambling joint] was operating. When the PM did arrive there, the doors were closed and the warehouse was empty.

GCMs assaltam bingo em São Caetano: Municipal guards try to rob an underground “bingo” in São Caetano do Sul, overpowering a military policeman moonlighting as security for the illegal gambling joint in a blue-collar São Paulo suburb.

The blue-collar São Paulo suburb, in a way.
The Agência Estado news agency reports, and the Jornal da Tarde (Estado group) runs it under the disapproving “eyebrow,” or rubric, of polícia bandida (“the cops are criminals.”)

Dois guardas civis municipais de São Caetano do Sul foram presos na madrugada de ontem, depois de tentar assaltar um bingo clandestino no centro da cidade. Para entrar no galpão, eles renderam um policial militar, que estaria fazendo “bico” de segurança no local. Do lado de dentro, um agente penitenciário, que também seria funcionário do bingo, chamou a polícia.

Two municipal guards from São Caetano do Sul were arrested late last night after trying to rob an underground “bingo” in the downtown area of the city. To get into the warehouse, they overpowered a military policeman who was reportedly “moonlighting” as a security guard there. A prison guard, also reportedly an employee of the “bingo,” called the police from inside the establishment.

A ação ocorreu por volta das 2h30 de. Os guardas Harlen Santos Mendes, 35 anos, e Gerson Ferreira, 36, chegaram armados, usando coletes à prova de balas da GCM e da Polícia Civil. Um homem chamado Wilson também teria participado do roubo, mas conseguiu fugir.

The incident took place around 2:30 a.m. Municipal guards Harlen Santos Mendes, 35, and Gerson Ferreira, 36, were armed and wearing bulletproof vests with markings of the municipal guard and the state judicial police. A man named Wilson was also reported in on the robbery but managed to escape.

São Paulo Police Blotter: Colonel’s Widow Wonders About “Nickel-Hunter” Connection

Ângela. Source: Agência Estado, whose photojournalism work is notable for its aesthetic quality (sometimes opting for dramatic impact over conveying actual information, but often impressive noneheless).

Mulher de coronel morto liga PMs bandidos à máfia dos caça-níqueis: “Wife of murdered colonel ties [crooked cops] to gambling rackets,” is the headline in the Estado de S. Paulo today.

Let me just knock off a quick translation of the sidebar to this newsmaker interview, which summarizes the accusations made by the wife of the district patrol commander who was rubbed out execution-style last month. The Estado has made a point of covering the story intensively. Which I, for one, really appreciate.

Caça-níqueis: Ângela Bruno, mulher do coronel José Hermínio Rodrigues, morto em 16 de janeiro, diz que o fato de PMs subordinados a ele terem encontrado envelopes contendo R$ 27 mil, em 25 de maio do ano passado, com o advogado Jamil Chokr, colocou o comandante em risco. O dinheiro seria destinado ao pagamento de propinas da máfia dos caça-níqueis para 84 dos 93 Distritos Policiais de toda a capital

“Nickel-hunter” machines: Ângela Bruno, wife of Col. Hermínio, who was killed on January 16, says the fact that military policemen under his command found envelopes containing R$27,000 last May 25 in the possession of attorney Jamil Chokr, put the commander at risk. The money was allegedly destined for gambling racket payoffs to 84 of the 93 state judicial police precincts in the city.

“Nickel-hunter” machines are what they call yak in Mexico — one-armed bandits, videopoker, that sort of thing.

Corrupção: PMs da zona norte socorreram Chokr, na Marginal do Tietê, após fuga de uma tentativa frustrada de assalto. Além da lista com os DPs que receberiam propinas da máfia, também foram encontrados nomes de policiais em agendas e também no telefone celular de Chokr. O inquérito segue, mas até agora não houve nenhum indiciamento

Corruption: PMs from the Northern Zone stopped to help Chokr on the Tietê beltway after he fled from a failed armed robbery attempt. Besides the list of police precincts that were allegedly getting mafia bribes, the names of policemen were found in datebooks and on the cellular phone belonging to Chokr. The investigation continues but has as yet produced no indictments.

On the case of the Chokr shocker, see also

• São Paulo: Police Chief Inspector Borked on Mafia Charge
• São Paulo Police Blotter: Caça-Níquel Top Cops Borked!
• São Paulo: More Mafia Spreadsheets!

Execuções: além de uma possível ligação com o caso Chokr, a investigação de participação de PMs da zona norte em grupo de extermínio também pode ser uma das motivações para o assassinato do coronel. Morto com seis tiros de pistola 380, usada por policiais, ele levou chute no rosto por um homem que calçava coturnos pretos, também usados por PMs. Das 11 chacinas de 2007, oito foram na zona norte

Executions: Besides a possible link to the Chokr case, the investigation of PMs involved in a death squad in the region might also have motivated the assassination of the colonel. Killed with six bullets from a .380 pistol of the kind used by police, he was kicked in the face by a man wearing black combat boots, also of the type worn by military policemen. Of the 11 execution-style multiple slayings in São Paulo in 2007, 8 occurred in the Northern Zone.

I though it was 13?

From the Annals of Maracutaia: Hard Time for Malufist Harvard MBA

Pitta: Veritas?

A Tarde (Salvador, Bahia, Brazil) reports: Former São Paulo mayor Celso Pitta (a Harvard MBA) has been sentenced to jail time.

A Justiça Federal condenou o ex-prefeito e ex-secretário das Finanças da Prefeitura de São Paulo, Celso Pitta, e o ex-coordenador municipal da dívida pública, Wagner Baptista Ramos, a quatro anos e quatro meses de prisão em regime semi-aberto.

A federal court sentenced former São Paulo mayor and municipal finance secretary Celso Pitta, along with former municipal debt coordinator Wagner Baptista Ramos, to four years and four months in prison.

Regime semi-aberto means, I think, that they can leave the prison during the day but must report back in at night.

Os dois foram condenados pelos crimes de desvio de verba pública e endividamento do município, no episódio que ficou conhecido como “escândalo dos precatórios”. A informação é da assessoria da Justiça Federal em São Paulo.

The two men were found guilty of embezzling public funds and debt, in an episode that came to be known as the “scandal of the [letters rogatory].” The report is from the press office of the federal judiciary in São Paulo.

De acordo com a denúncia do Ministério Público Federal, os dois inseriam declarações falsas em documentos públicos para justificar o pedido de emissão de títulos públicos no valor de US$ 600 milhões (cerca de R$ 1 bilhão) ao Senado Federal, com autorização do então prefeito Paulo Maluf. Os valores deveriam ser destinados ao pagamento de precatórios.

According to the indictment brought by the federal prosecutor [MPF], the two men inserted false statements into public documents in order to justify a request to the Federal Senate to issue of [municipal bonds] in the value of US$600 million (nearly R$1 billion), with the authorization of then mayor Paulo Maluf. The funds were to be used to pay off the letters rogatory.

São Paulo: “Killer Cops in Custody”

Extreme institutional message-control malfunction: ROTA gets a YouTube music video straight out of A Clockwork Orange. “If you run, ROTA will get you. If you don’t, ROTA will gun you down.” Source: G1/Globo.

Presos PMs do 18º Batalhão acusados de execução: “Military policemen from the 18th Battalion accused of execution-style slaying.” The Estado de S. Paulo continues to own the story of death squads in the northern district of the capital city. See also

• São Paulo: “Photos Show That the Killers of the 18th Executed 2 Patsies to Cover Up Massacre”
• São Paulo: “Technically, No Death Threats By Killers of the 18th,” Says PM

SÃO PAULO – Policiais do Departamento de Homicídios e Proteção à Pessoa (DHPP) e da Corregedoria da Polícia Militar prenderam neste sábado o sargento José Rivanildo da Silva Sá, de 38 anos, e os soldados Luzinário Moreira do Nascimento, de 32 anos, Ricardo Gonçalves de Moraes, de 38, e Eliabe Antonio de Mello, de 32. Todos são lotados na Força Tática do 18º Batalhão, que era comandado pelo coronel José Hermínio Rodrigues, morto em 16 de janeiro. A polícia suspeita que o militar tenha sido morto porque combatia a atuação de policiais em grupos de extermínio na zona norte de São Paulo.

Police from the Homicide Bureau and military police [internal affairs] arrested this Saturday (February 16) Sgt. José Rivanildo da Silva Sá, 38, and Pvts. Luzinário Moreira do Nascimento, 32, Ricardo Gonçalves de Moraes, 38, and Eliabe Antonio de Mello, 32. All are assigned to the Tactical Force of the 18th Military Police Battalion, which was commanded by Col. José Hermínio Rodrigues, assassinated on January 16.

Col. Hermínio Rodrigues was actually something like the district patrol commander for the area the 18th operates in. The battalion commander, the Estadão has been reporting, requested a transfer after receiving death threats.

Grotesque scene: Col. José gets shot down like a dog — reportedly by low-level (in)subordinates.

Prêt-a-Portinari: São Paulo Museum Struggles to Fill in the Negative Space

O Lavrador de café (1934), by Cândido Portinari: This iconic portrait of a migrant laborer has hit the Great Sino-Paraguayan Silk Road and left no forwarding address.

“We do not have access to the total amount of the museum’s debt. The government cannot support an indebted institution. The museum’s security system was debilitated and compromised. Investment is required to cure this situation.” Bianchi said that MASP’s 2007 accounting statements, requested by the prosecutor, were not presented at the Friday meeting as requested. Despite denying that state funds would be provided, Bianchi also stated that such a step was, in fact, necessary.

Para especialistas, governo precisa administrar o Masp: The Niemeyer-designed Art Museum of São Paulo made the news recently when a gang of art thieves waltzed in and snatched two paintings: A Picasso and an iconic Portinari portrait of a coffee-worker in the school of Thomas Hart Benton.

As the media spotlight turned to the museum, it also emerged that the cultural institution is reportedly R$100 million in debt. A proposal earlier this was to permit the construction of a some kind of transmission tower atop the landmark building — cellular or microwave repeater, I think, but I forget — to provide additional operating revenue. This provoked loud shrieks from architectural purists.

(Remember that episode of The Simpsons in which our favorite Springfieldians get into debt and are forced to let a cellular company install a transmission tower atop their home?)

G1 reports that “specialists” want the government to take over running the musuem, while state prosecutors summon museum management to explain where all the money got to.

This should make an interesting case to read alongside the administrative innovations at the Guggenheim chronicled by Paul Warner in Museum, Inc.

A similar crisis hit INCOR — a cardiology hospital famous throughout Latin America — last year when it was suddenly unable to meet its payroll.

G1 is citing state officials as denying — sort of — that the state will bail out the institution while leaving the current management in place.

O presidente do Museu de Arte de São Paulo (Masp), Júlio Neves, participa de uma reunião no Ministério Público Estadual (MPE) nesta sexta-feira (28). Ele foi intimado pela promotora Mariza Schiavo Tucunduva para discutir a situação financeira do museu, segundo informou a assessoria de imprensa do MPE. Também poderá ser discutido uma forma de o governo do estado passar a auxiliar a instituição.

The president of MASP, Júlio Neves, is meeting today (Decembeer 28) with the state Public Ministry (MPE). He was summoned by prosecutor Mariza Schiavo Tucunduva to discuss the financial condition of the museum, according to the MPE press office. Also on the agenda may be some way for the state government to come to the institution’s aid.

São Paulo Diary: “The First Thing We Do is Retest All the Lawyers”

“There are four ways of getting into the OAB. One is passing the test. The other is paying the OAB directly for a license to practice. This costs between R$30,000 and R$40,000. The third is to pay someone to take the test for you. This costs around R$10,000. The last is to buy the answer key, which costs R$2,500,” said the law student, justifying his participation in the fraud scheme.

In August, another test administered by VUNESP was also cancelled on suspicion of fraud — a public examination for administrative employees of the São Paulo City Council. The cancellation was initiated at the time by VUNESP itself, which noticed that the highest scores were achieved on the test were people with the same surname.

Deprive a capitalist of his God-given right to lie and cheat and steal, and the poor sap stands a better than even chance of becoming one of the abominable wards of the state from whose grimy fingers the Reagan Administration hopes to snatch the ark of democracy. –Lewis Lapham, “Moral Dandyism,” Harper’s (New York, July 1985).

OAB apura venda de prova por R$ 2.500: “São Paulo bar association investigates sale of bar exam for [about US$1,400].”

Answers to a competitive exam for posts with the federal highway patrol was recently reported on offer for some $R40,000 (US$22,000).

An interesting comparative price-check, if true, although the bar exam is pass-fail, while the police exam is designed to select a fixed number of high-scorers.

A follow-up to

• São Paulo: “Tupi ABA Says Someone (May Have) Messed With Test”

Ordem dos Advogados do Brasil em São Paulo está investigando uma informação de que a prova do exame nº 134, que seria aplicada no último domingo (9) e foi cancelada por suspeita de fraude, teria sido vendida para um aluno de Santo André, na Grande São Paulo, por R$ 2.500.

The Order of Brazilian Attorneys in São Paulo is checking out a report that the page proofs of bar exam No. 134, scheduled to be given last Sunday but canceled on suspicion of fraud, was sold to a student in Santo André, Greater São Paulo, for R$2,500.

Segundo a assessoria de imprensa da OAB-SP, o aluno teria comprado a prova de um funcionário da Fundação Vunesp, responsável pela impressão e aplicação do exame. Com o cancelamento do exame, esse aluno teria procurado um jornal da região para apresentar a documentação que comprovava que o conteúdo havia vazado. O repórter que publicou a matéria foi chamado para depor na OAB-SP e apresentou partes da prova que o aluno teria comprado. Segundo a OAB, o documento era original.

According to the OAB-SP press office, the student bough the exam from an employee of the VUNESP Foundation, which is in charge of printing and adminstering the test. When the exam was canceled, this student went to an area newspaper to present documents proving the contents had leaked. The reporter who published the article was summoned to give a statement at OAB-SP, and presented part of the test the student said he had purchased. The OAB said the document was authentic.

Globo seems to have a policy of never, ever admitting the existence of its competitors. Why can it not tell us the name of the newspaper that ran the story, for example?

The fact that the newspaper published the story for everyone with R$1 to read would tend to suggest that it was not seeking anonymity as a news source. What other legitimate reason is there for not naming the source of a news report if not a request for anonymity?

It was Bruno Ribeiro for the Diário do ABC.

A pretty decent newspaper, the Diário, I tend to think, though I have not studied it in depth. (It does, however, commit some hearsay to paper and ink in the article that follows.)

Let us go to Bruno for the rest of the story, therefore.

After all, Bruno had it straight from the horse’s mouth, and the story apparently panned out.

Bruno’s horse has a lot more to say than G1’s rewriting of the OAB press release relates, what is more.

Um estagiário de Direito morador da região (que pediu para não ser identificado) diz ter pago R$ 2.500 para receber antecipadamente a prova da OAB-SP (Ordem dos Advogados do Brasil Seccional São Paulo), que seria realizada no domingo. Ele teria dividido o valor entre outros quatro amigos e cada um teria pago R$ 500. A prova foi cancelada no sábado por suspeita de fraude.

A law intern from the area (who asked not to be identified) says he paid R$2,500 to get an advance copy of the OAB-SP test scheduled for last Sunday. He sayshe shared the cost with four friends, each of whom contributed R$500. The test was cancelled on Saturday on suspicion of fraud.

A suspeita se deu após o professor de um cursinho preparatório para o exame da ordem dar duas questões da prova para seus alunos, em São João da Boa Vista, no Interior do Estado.

The suspicion arose after a prep-course teacher for the exam gave two questions from the exam to his students, in São João da Boa Vista, in São Paulo state.

Um promotor da cidade descobriu as questões e repassou ao procurador-geral de Justiça, Rodrigo César Rebello Pinho. Esse, por sua vez, encaminhou a mensagem ao presidente da OAB-SP, Luiz Flávio Borges D’Urso, que pediu que o exame fosse suspenso.

A city prosecutor discovered the questions and passed them to the state attorney general, who, in turn, contacted OAB-SP president Borges D’Urso, who called for the exam to be suspended.

Bada Bingo Bada Bang: Heavy Arms in Vacant Gambling Joint

Bingo Jabaquara, Southern Zone, São Paulo. Jumping-off point for Santos. Source: Fotoagência NMM(-TV)SNBCNNBS-Tabajara (me).

Armas e munições são apreendidas em bingo lacrado em SP: Arms and ammunition found in a sealed bingo in Santana, near the main bus terminal, here in São Paulo.

SÃO PAULO – A polícia apreendeu munição, algumas de uso exclusivo das Forças Armadas, e várias armas por volta das 2h15 desta sexta-feira, 23, no interior do Bingo Cruzeiro do Sul, na zona norta da capital paulista. Localizada na altura do nº 3.108 da Avenida Cruzeiro do Sul, no bairro de Santana, ao lado do terminal rodoviário do Tietê, a casa de jogos foi fechada em definitivo pela Prefeitura em julho deste ano.

Police seized ammunition, some of it reserved for Armed Forces use, and a number of weapons on Friday, November 23, at 2:14 am, from inside the Bingo Cruzeiro do Sul in the northern district of the city. Locate at 3108 Cruzeiro do Sul Ave., in Santana, next to the Tietê bus terminal, the gaming house was shut down for good by the city government in July of this year.

Nesta madrugada, o segurança que toma conta do estabelecimento, ao abrir um dos compartimentos de um armário que era utilizado pelos funcionários, encontrou nele duas pistolas calibre 380, um revólver calibre 38, outro calibre 32, uma granada de ferro, um sinalizador de luz e som e um explosivo de gás lacrimogêneo.

In the early morning hours of Friday, the security guard looking after the establishment, upon opening a closet used by employees, found two .380 pistols, a .38 revolver, a .32 revolver, a hand grenade, a siren and flasher unit, and a tear gas round.

Knowledge Importation Through the Port of Santos: Final Results

Customs inspectors are the ones making the most easy money in this country, after politicians. To give you an example of how shameless they are, a friend of mine moved from Germany to Brazil and was obliged to pay a bribe of 500 euros for the Santos inspectors to release the container with his personal stuff. His family slept on the floor of their apartment on borrowed mattresses and blankets for two weeks. The strategies of these bums is to slow down the release of goods until the daily storage fees run so high that people pay the bribe in order to save money! And no one does a thing. –Anonymous comment on the Cisco case, estadao.com.br, October 16, 2007; see also “American Tech Firm Cheats Tax Man of Gazillions”

Bribe required to liberate our 27 boxes of books and clothing, shipped through the Port of Santos, which arrived today: R$200.

See also:

• Current Content Downloads: The Port of Santos Cooks My Books

This on top of storage fees on a shipment we had been assured would pass directly through customs without delay.

Paid to whom, for what, we are not quite sure, I hasten to add. The context of the conversation was conducive, let us just say, to requesting that information. All we know is that an unscheduled, ad hoc R$200 cash payment was suddenly necessary to complete the transaction.

The boxes arrived with all the books we put into them, but with about 75% of the clothing we put into them missing.

That is, plundered. Ripped off.

Including my classic black “my name is Vinnie from Bensonhurst, so don’t fuck with me” leather jacket, which I have worn through terrorist attacks, killer thunderstorms, countless perilous existential adventures in flyover country, and stellar evenings of idle conversations in the sidewalk cafés of Little Italy and New York City generally, and which I am (was) extremely attached to.

São Paulo Diary: The More Things Rain, the More Things Remain a Pain

Imagine if the Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges both went down at once, for an entire week. To get to the financial district, you have to route through Long Island City to the 59th Street Bridge, then catch the FDR back down.

Even on a good day, you would better off rowing, or swimming, the East River and rollerblading the rest of the way.
The closure, due to landslides, of the Rebouças Tunnel in Rio — the route from Santos Dumont airport to the Zona Sul — is an event on that order, I think. Which is what makes the Zona Sul — accessible by just two or three tunnels, I forget exactly — something of a Fortress of Solitude, or a Laputa, Island in the Sky.

Meanwhile, official reports are suggesting that weapons caches belonging to the drug trade are being moved to the “asphalt” of the Zona Sul from the favelas due to constant police raids on the shantytown redoubts of the local Bolivian marching powder distributors. See also

• “Tropa de Elite Tells It Like It Is”: Drug Demand Comes From Richest Brazilians, Says Economist

The state public safety secretary, while making this point, and defending his commitment to an “intelligence-based” approach to the problem, catches serious flak — fairly or unfairly, I am not entirely sure — over being quoted as suggesting that “coming in blasting is one thing in the favelas, and another thing entirely in Copacabana.”

Reports of major drug moguls living high on the hog in the wealthiest neighborhoods of Brazilian cities are getting more common.

The rainy season has begun.

Here in São Paulo, five minutes after the first good storm of the season gets rolling, a number of things happen: (1) a good portion of the electricity grid goes down, so (2) naturally, the Marinho-Slim global plastic fantastic broadband infotainment network drops offlline for hours and hours, even though electrical service continues in our part of town; and (3) our telephone service goes dark.

The Telefônica repairman has to make three visits before we are communicado again. This time we are lucky: the man from the outsourced service company — a different local provider than last time, I think — is pleasant, competent, and businesslike. A typical hero of Brazilian labor. (As is the electrician who comes in to make sure our electric showerhead — you heard me — is still safe and sane.)

(I mean that: It is not as though pride in craftmanship is unknown in these parts. You should meet the mestre de obras who did a project on our funky house recently. The guy builds amazingly good.)

Last time, an indecent proposal regarding an, ahem, supplemental off-the-books side fee for “real” as opposed to “by the book” service maintenance was proposed.

The Sidewalks of São Paulo: Marching to the Beat of the GONGO Bongo?

“The solution is secession [separation]!” If the rest of Brazil wants [Squid], let them have him. We will stick with Alckmin. Down with [Squid]!” Grassroots campaign literature, 2006. São Paulo made successive attempts, of fascist inspiration, to secede from the federal union in the 1930s.

GONGO stands for Government-operated Non-governmental organization. It is usually a governmental organization that poses as an NGO in order to give progovernmental information.

Maracutaia (PT-Br): “Obscure dealings, illicit maneuvers, especially in politics or management; trafficking, fraud, [obscure and skeevy] wheeling and dealing. Origin uncertain, probably from Tupi-Guarani, as a composite of mara “confusion, disorder” + ku “tongue, faculty of speech” + taya “pepper.” First recorded by Teodoro Sampaio.” –Definition by the Houaiss dictionary, my creative, draft-quality translation.

I did this within a philosophical framework, and a moral and legal framework. And I have been turned into a cartoon of the greatest villain in the history of lobbying. –Jack Abramoff

MP de SP apura favorecimento à ONG ligada a tucanos: State prosecutor of São Paulo investigates NGO with ties to the current party of government. The Estado de S. Paulo reports.

The federal Senate has also just installed a parliamentary commission of inquiry on the nonprofit sector, the “CPI of NGOs,” looking at the outsourcing of government services to so-called “OSCIPS” — “public-interest civil society organizations” — from 1999-2006.

That is, under both Cardoso II and Lula I, after the passage of law permitting and regulating (in theory) this sort of public-private partnership in 1999.

The timeframe was a source of major political wrangling, the subtext being the usual framing of the blame game: Which party presided over the most massive NGO-related maracutaias: the last party of government or the current one?

The newly created CGU, a federal controller’s office attached to the executive which to some extent seems to compete (tooth and nail at times) with the TCU — the judicary’s federal accounting tribunal — says it will contribute significantly to the CPI of NGOs. See also

• Tropa de Elite: Embedded Political Commentary on NGOs

The issue has been in the news quite a bit lately, and not just in Brazil. See

• Cardosos, Too, Danced The Quango Tango?”
• USP’s Quango Tango and the Shock Troop of the New
• Naím Bangs the Gongo on Quango Governance
• São Paulo: Did Harvard Man Love The Second Superpower Too Much?
• Rocks Thrown At Fox For Dancing the Cardoso Quango Tango
• Cardoso Foundation Sewer Inflow Probed
• Cardoso Quango Questioned
• Dommage to Catalonia? “Peninsular HMO Borked For Dancing Quango Tango!”
• Brazilian NGOs: Time to Pay the Piper for Quango Tango?
• Dilma: ‘All Quangos Are Created Equal’

Still, although the following report suggests that a lot of the alleged maracutaias went on under then-Mayor José Serra, it was also Serra who promised, early in his term as governor, to undertake a systematic review of the state’s contracts, including its public-private partnerships.

Serra’s refusal to intervene in a state assembly probe of the Nossa Caixa state credit union — in which a caixa dois, or political slush fund, scheme is suspected involving the laundering of money to political cronies through NGOs, through fraud in advertising budgets — was reported to have enraged supporters of his internal political rival and predecessor as governor, Geraldo Alckmin. His laconic phrase: “Corruption has to be combated, no matter who gets hurt.”

My petista friends cannot stand the guy, but even my Greenish-petista wife thinks he was pretty okay as federal health minister. And I can at least say this: When he opens his mouth, gabbling nonsense does not tend to emerge.

Laundering public and private money through advertising budgets into political slush funds is, of course, the basic premise of the so-called valeriodúto scandal here — which it amuses me to refer to as the Belo Horizonte Baldy case, after its central figure, a big-time ad exec from the capital city of Minas Gerais.

To the newsflow:

SÃO PAULO – O Ministério Público Estadual investiga as relações do Instituto de Desenvolvimento, Logística, Transportes e Meio Ambiente (Idelt) com o governo paulista e prefeituras. O Idelt é uma organização não governamental criada por Alberto Goldman (PSDB), vice-governador paulista, Frederico Bussinger, ex-secretário municipal de Transportes de São Paulo, e Thomaz de Aquino Nogueira Neto, atual presidente da Desenvolvimento Rodoviário S.A. (Dersa), entre outras pessoas ligadas ao setor de transporte público e ao PSDB. É presidido pela mulher de Bussinger, Vera Bussinger. E recebeu pelo menos R$ 5 milhões dos cofres públicos nos últimos sete anos.

The state prosecutor is investigating the relationship of the Institute for Development, Logistics, Transportation and the Environment (IDELT) with the state and municipal governments. IDELT is an NGO created by [federal deputy] Alberto Goldman (PSDB), the vice-governor of São Paulo, Frederico Bussinger — who formerly served as São Paulo’s municipal transportation secretary — and Thomaz de Aquino Nogueira Neto, current president of the [Highway Development, S.A.] (DERSA), among other persons with ties to the public transportation sector and the PSDB political party. IDELT is presided over by Bussinger’s wife, Vera Bussinger, and received at least R$5 million from the public treasury over the last seven years.

São Paulo Annals of Crime: Did Narcs Play the Lollipop Guild for Suckers?

The Estadão’s Web site redesign — it has many features in common with Colombia’s El Tiempo, I find — has lots of bugs to iron out. Which reveals an interesting factoid: The Estadão server now runs on Penguin power at Port 80.

Want to get rid of drug trafficking in São Paulo? Just get rid of the state narcotics division. –Juan Carlos “Chupeta” Abadia, cited by the Folha de S. Paulo

Polícia afasta 8 policiais acusados de achacar megatraficante: The Estadão (São Paulo, Brazil) follows up on charges that the local narcotics division extorted the biggest Colombian drug dealer since Escobar, rather than arresting him.

Eight police officers accused of such shennanigans have now been suspended, as I think is implied by the news that they were afastado. I am never quite sure: police disciplinary procedures can be something of a mystery.

As an earlier report by the Folha apparently forgot to mention, when the wife of a member of the Lollipop Guild was “taken in for questioning” — which sounds legitimate enough — a large sum of money was allegedly paid to get her back out again.

See

• São Paulo: Folha Reveals All About Secret Narcocorruption Investigation!

Abadia, known as “Chupeta” — which I tend to translate as “The Lollipop Kid,” since chupeta means the same thing in Colombia as pirulito in Brazil — is quoted elsewhere today as saying he wants to be extradited to the United States sooner than now.

U.S. prisons have cable TV and ping pong.

São Paulo jails reputedly don’t. And then some.

The Brazilians, however, reportedly want first crack at him, unlike the Mexican government in the Ye Gon case. The Los Angeles Times recently published a report that jeers at Brazilian federal police — it uses a lot of demeaning adjectives to describe, for instance, “operations with colorful names,” as I recall.

But a recent poll indicates the PF enjoy a high degree of prestige among the public here, for such feats as purging their own ranks of corruption and going up against some really big-time organized criminal organizations.

White collar perp-walks, as one observer noted, astutely, are also popular. “Equal justice under the law” being regarded as a farce by large swaths of the povão. Which may be why white-collar perps tend to scream that the PF are a “politicized Gestapo.”

Zhenli Ye Gon, the DEA’s “man behind the meth” in Mexico — the man with that huge mountain of money stashed in his closet, some of which he claimed was part of a political slush fund to be laundered for PAN — similarly reported having been extorted rather than busted, in his case by Mexican federales.

SÃO PAULO – A Delegacia Geral decidiu afastar três delegados, quatro investigadores e um agente policial investigados pelo Ministério Público e pela Corrgedoria da Polícia Civil sob a suspeita de envolvimento nos achaques, seqüestros, roubos e tortura praticados por policiais contra integrantes da quadrialha [sic] do megatraficante colombiano Juan Carlos Ramirez Abadía.

State judicial police leadership decided to suspend three precinct commanders, four detectives and a rank-and-file police agent who are being investigated by prosecutors and internal affairs on suspicion of involvement in assaults, kidnappings, robbery and torture committed by police against members of the [Lollipop Guild] headed by world-class drug lord Ramirez Abadía.

Na sexta-feira, 5, o ministro da Justiça, Tarso Genro, defendeu que Abadía só seja extraditado após cumprir a pena no Brasil. També na sexta, o juiz Fausto de Sanctis ouviu os últimos cinco acusados de integrar o bando do megatraficante, entre eles Daniel Bráz Maróstica e Ana Maria Stein. O advogado do casal, Julio Clímaco Jr., não comentou os achaques que seus clientes teriam sofrido.

On Friday, the federal justice minister, Genro, argued that Abadia should only be extradited after doing his time in Brazil. The same day, Judge de Santcis heard from the last five alleged members of the drug lord’s gang, among them Daniel Bráz Maróstica and Ana Maria Stein. The couple’s attorney, a Mr. Clímaco, would not comment on the attacks his clients allegedly suffered.

Brazil: Note From The Clampdown on CC5 Accounts

Brazilian doleiros ply their trade.

… one São Paulo doleiro, for example, known as “Wanted Suspect No. 24,” who appears in the principal report on the operation as the owner of an offshore firm called Watson, in the British Virgin Islands, is accused of moving, on his own, in a single year, some US$598 million.

The federal police will open a probe of 3,500 persons and firms suspected of illegal financial transfers to the United States between 1999 and 2002. The persons under investigation are politicians, entertainers, football players and civil servants. Included on the list are banker Daniel Dantas of Opportunity (also suspected of ties to the [“Belo Horizonte Baldy Trans-New Iberian Pipeline of Political Slush Funds”], [iconic Globo] TV personality Xuxa Meneguel, and [1,000 goal-scoring] football star Romário. The names of federal lawmakers are also cited, in which cases the PF will have to ask the Supreme Court for authorization to investigate. –October 1, 2005, citing “news agencies”

“We are not going to become some kind of Grand Caymans on the Hudson.” –Manhattan DA Morgenthau on the proof against Maluf.

Consultor Jurídico (Brazil) introduces me to a new concept: the CC5 account.

A 21 August 2006 note from a personal-interest clippings site on news of financial crimes fills in some of the background.

Representatives of a task force set up by the Brazilian federal government to investigate the extent of clandestine money transfers in the country’s so-called “parallel market” told journalists in early June that their work so far had revealed the activities of 64 illegal money transferors (known in Brazil as “doleiros“) resulting in the movement of $19.53 billion from Brazil to banks in the United States between 1996 and 2003.

That would be $20 billion on which no taxes got paid — money that might have, you know, funded the repaving of this bumpy, ramshackle little street we live on — where 19th century paralelepípedos peek through a thin layer of tar — or something.

On doleiros as a practicioners of “innovations in finance,” see also

• Psst? Got Dollars? 2.0

Seriously: some guy who offers to meet you at a given time and place to do face-to-face cash deals — the Internet angle was that you arranged these meetings through the magic of e-mail! — managed to describe the scheme as an instance of Web 2.0 so convincingly that it was featured on a prominent “what’s new in Web 2.0” Web site.

Which made me laugh until milk shot out of my nose.

The totals were reportedly derived from investigations carried out by the CC5 task force which was charged with looking into alleged abuses of the use of certain bank accounts- known as CC5 accounts — permitted by Brazil’s Central Bank to be used for legitimate foreign fund transfers. Investigations over the last few years have found that certain CC5 accounts were used in large-scale money laundering activities, often allegedly carried out using doleiros as intermediaries, which were found to be related to money laundering networks at certain New York banks. (See “Financial Crime News” Special Report “Dollars, Doleiros, and Dominos: South American Money Scandals” July 2005, which also includes information on the “Tri-Border Region.”)

São Paulo Annals of Crime: Was Death Chop Shop a Death Cop Shop?

A desmanche in Ceará, Brazil

The Diário do Grande ABC (São Paulo, Brazil) reports: Cops probed over a massacre in Ribeirão Pires are suspected of having had an equity stake in an autombile chop shop — where stolen cars are taken to be stripped for parts — that was denounced to the police by one of the victims.

A chacina do último dia 15, em Ribeirão Pires, pode ter sido motivada por vingança. Os quatro policiais militares suspeitos de envolvimento no crime teriam ido ao bar do bairro Quarta Divisão naquela noite para acertar contas com um delator. O homem procurado teria sido responsável pelo fechamento de um desmanche clandestino, que os policiais tinham participação.

The massacre that took place in Ribeirão Pires on September 15 may have been motivated by revenge. The four military police troopers suspected in the crime may have gone to the Fourth Division bar that night to settle a score with an informer. The man they sought was thought responsible for the closing of an underground chop shop in which the policemen had a stake.

O desmanche funcionava na Avenida Miro Attilio Peduzzi. Mesma rua do bar onde ocorreu a maior chacina do ano – com oito mortos. O comércio irregular foi fechado pela polícia um dia antes dos assassinatos. Três dos mortos tinham passagem pela polícia por receptação de carro. O que reforça a linha de investigação da polícia.

The chop shop operated on Miro Attilio Peduzzi Avenue. The same street as the bar where the worst massacre of the year took place, leaving eight dead. The irregular business was closed by police one day before the murders. Three of the persons killed had police records for receiving stolen vehicles, which reinforces the theory under which the police investigation is proceeding.

O projéteis encontrados no local do crime e nas vítimas são de armas 9 milímetros (da Força Armada e da Polícia Federal) e de revólver 380, fácil de ser comprada. Os laudos da balística do Instituto de Criminalística que serão decisivos para comprovar ou não a participação de policiais no crime estão para ser apresentados.

The bullets found at the crime scene and in the victims were from 9mm pistols (used by the armed forces and federal police) and .380 revolvers, which are easy to buy. Results of the ballistics tests by the criminalistics institute, which will be decisive in proving or disproving the involvement of the four policemen, have not yet been presented.

“I Am Death”: No Proof

A nationwide phenomenon: “The Le Cocq was accused of 30 political murders in 18 years, on top of the nearly 1,500 murders a year that transformed Espirito Santo into the second most violent state in Brazil. It was created in Rio in 1965 by police who wanted to avenge the death of Detective Milton Le Cocq. Horseface, the bandit who killed Le Cocq, was killed with more than 100 gunshots and his body covered with a poster depicting a skull. … A legislative probe of the drug traffic pointed to six Espirito Santo state police officials and 24 policemen as members of organized crime. All of them belonged to the Scuderie Le Cocq … the members of the Scuderie Le Cocq created a campaign financing scheme for mayors, legislators and aldermen. When these candidates took office, the Scuderie would show up to demand a bribe in the form of fraudulent public contracts.”

Accused of murder and belonging to a death squad in Osasco, Pvt. Natanael Viana, 38, was taken into preventive custody by judicial order. He had been accused by the police ombudsman in 2001 of alleged involvement in another death squad, but the case was archived and Viana returned to active duty. “To this day there is no proof he killed anyone. In 2001, the process was the same: a charge that generated an exhaustive search for evidence that was never found,” said the colonel.

São Paulo’s Secretaria da Segurança Pública issues a press release on a press conference yesterday regarding steps taken in the case of military policemen suspected of death-squad activities.

A follow-up to

• “I Am Death”: 20 Police Probed in São Paulo Death Squad Case

O coronel Roberto Antonio Diniz, Comandante Geral da Polícia Militar, informou, em entrevista coletiva concedida na tarde desta segunda-feira (24), na sede da corporação, que 121 PMs que tiveram uma conduta irregular já foram expulsos ou demitidos da corporação neste ano. “Temos 90 mil policiais no Estado, que realizam um milhão e 500 mil intervenções por mês. É de se esperar que haja alguns desvios, mas fazemos o possível para evitá-los”, disse o coronel.

Col. Diniz, state military police commandant, reported yesterday in a press conference at PM headquarters that 121 troopers found to have engaged in misconduct have been expelled or fired from the force this year. “We have 90,000 policemen in the state, involved in 1.5 million actions per month. It is only to be expected that some misconduct will occur, but we do what we can to avoid it,” the colonel said.

Sobre o envolvimento de PMs com grupos de extermínio, o coronel declarou que “a PM tem uma filosofia bem clara, que está fundamentada no respeito à vida e à integridade das pessoas. Nós jamais estaríamos de acordo com esse tipo de atuação”, declarou. Segundo o coronel, pelas investigações realizadas até hoje não foi constatada a atuação desses grupos dentro da corporação.

Regarding the involvement of troopers in death squads, the colonel stated that “the state PM has a clear philosophy, based on respect for life and the physical integrity of persons. We would never agree with that sort of conduct,” he said. According to the colonel, investigations realized to date have not turned up any such groups acting inside the force.

Headline in A Tarde (Salvador, Bahia, Brazil) today:

• 25 São Paulo Military Police Suspended Over Suspicion of Death-Squad Activity

São Paulo: “Sex-Death Hotelier T-Shirt Benefits Orphans!”

Camisetas do dono do Bahamas rendem R$ 6 mil a orfanato: “T-shirts featuring Bahamas nightclub owner yield R$6,000 for orphanage.”

Back when I first met my wife and we traveled to Los Angeles together on family business of mine, our friends back in São Paulo all wanted the same thing: Go to a certain boutique in Westlake and get everyone a cheap “Free Winona (Ryder)” t-shirt.

Which we did. I also took Neuza to the Saks Fifth Avenue on Wilshire Blvd. where Winona was arrested for shoplifting, snapped her with the bronze statue of John Wayne at the editorial offices of Hustler magazine, took her to the Westwood military cemetry where my granddad, the Colonel, is buried, and showed her the UCLA hospital where I was born.

I was talking (drinking “stupefyingly chilled” beer) with some friends here in Sampa the other evening and none of them were aware that the saga of São Paulo “sex entrepreneur” Oscar Maroni has been featured on the front page of the Wall Street Journal:

• São Paulo: “Sex-Death Hotelier Makes the Cover of the Rolling Stone!”

They did, however, tell me the joke that’s going around about the guy:

A plane crashes at Congonhas, killing nearly 200 people. And who do they arrest? The guy who owns the whorehouse!

A follow-up, from G1/Globo.

Se por um lado a confecção de camisetas com as inscrições “Free Oscar” foi encarada como mais uma “jogada de marketing” do dono da boate Bahamas, Oscar Maroni, na outra ponta, a instituição de caridade para onde o dinheiro das vendas é direcionado agradece à popularidade do empresário, preso desde 14 de agosto.

If on one hand the making up of t-shirts bearing the inscription “Free Oscar” has been tagged as just another “marketing ploy” by the owner of the Bahamas nightclub, Oscar Maroni, on the other hand, the charitable institution to which the proceeds of sales of the t-shirts is destined is grateful for the popularity of the businessman, who has been in jail since August 14.

São Paulo: New Subprefect for the See

“What is the greatest pride of the São Paulo native today?” Top answer: “Stick a fork in it, this sucker is done.” Second: “Cultural ferment and bohemia.” Third: “The power of money.” Fourth: “The Mayor’s Clean City law.” Source: the late, lamented No Mínimo.

Brazil’s Centro de Mídia Independente has an interesting note that I missed:

Na terça-feira da semana passada, 11 de setembro, o ex-chefe da polícia civil de São Paulo, Mario Jordão Toledo Leme, assumiu a subprefeitura da Sé em São Paulo. Nomeado pelo coordenador das subprefeituras e também empresário do ramo imobiliário, Andrea Matarazzo, Leme assumiu o posto após se afastar do cargo de delegado-geral da Polícia Civil de São Paulo, no qual atuou entre dezembro de 2002 a dezembro de 2006.

On  September 11, former state police chief Mario Jordão Toledo Leme was named the subprefect for the Sé district (historic downtown) of São Paulo. Named by real estate entrepreneur Andrea Matarazzo, the city’s coordinator of subprefectures, Leme assumes the post after stepping down as state police chief, in which cpacity he served from December 2002 to December 2006.

On his replacement, see

• São Paulo: “New Top Cop is Veteran of DOPS, Miami SWAT”

On Matarazzo — who if I understand this correctly has stepped down himself as subprefect of Sé — see also:

• São Paulo Diary: Sundown on the Bingo Matarazzo?
• Sampa Diary: More on Matarazzo
• Sharp Threads: Amorim on Matarazzo and Mangabeira

On intimations of bingo-based corruption  in the São Paulo subprefectures — expect more developments on this topic in the future — see also

• São Paulo: Bingo Bombs in Butantã!

O afastamento de Leme do cargo deu-se após denúncias de corrupção envolvendo membros de sua corporação, além de divergências com o Secretário Estadual de Segurança Pública, Ronaldo Marzagão. O novo subprefeito iniciou sua carreira policial trabalhando como investigador do Dops (Departamento de Ordem e Política Social), órgão de repressão da ditadura militar que matou e torturou diversos militantes políticos da época.

Leme’s departure  came in the wake of corruption charges involving state police, as well as differences with state public security secretary Marzagão. 

“São Paulo’s Trooper Elite”: The Estadão on ROTA

How much has changed since the Globo reporter’s 1992 exposé on São Paulo’s “police who kill”? It’s a fair question. The Estado goes looking for answers.

At the time this happened, the two marginals were already dead and stowed in the trunk of the squad cars. They were already dead. Two plainclothes troopers got in the pickup to simulate the hot pursuit, but what nearly spoiled the thing was that a TV news team was nearby and started filming. But when the pickup stopped and the shooting started, the TV news people stopped. So this is what happened: The TV news report showed one thing, but it benefited the police, because it did not show what really happened there.

It has yet to appear on the Web site of the Estadao daily here in São Paulo, but the front page of the Sunday edition’s Metrópole section has quite a tale to tell.

The very pointed eyebrow to the story: “Police Violence: São Paulo’s version of Elite da Tropa.”

And there is nothing fictional or Hollywood glamorous about it.

It is the standard sinister tale — “no one dead was innocent” — you have heard with some frequency from metropolitan police in Brazil for decades.

A trooper from ROTA, “the feared trooper elite of the São Paulo military elite,” has been working with Estadão reporters for a year now on crimes committed by the police unit featured in Caco Barcellos’ Rota 66: The Story of Police Who Kill (my Editora Globo 8th Edition is from 1992).

Let me just give you a quick sample, translating off the newsprint:

P. narrates a case that took place during the wave of attacks [on São Paulo military police in May 2006.] According to the official version, four “bandits” had stolen a vehicle and were going to use it in an attack. Two died and two fled. But the story according to this ROTA trooper is quite different.”

The story is that the police killed some random guys, then staged a pursuit and shootout in order to claim the incident as a clash with the PCC criminal organization.

São Paulo: “Criminal Statistics Off By 13,000 in ABC”

Ex-Governor Alckmin: Audits of state public security statistics and public-works contracts underway.

We need a communications policy and an ongoing dialogue with the mass media that will guarantee that the sense of risk is proportionate to the actual risk. –Rio de Janeiro mayor Cesar Maia, December 2006

Lula should be IMPEACHED for criminal association with a narco-guerrilla group, the FARC! Just look! El Tiempo reports that Brazil is offering to let Chávez and FARC negotiators meet on Brazilian soil! –Rio de Janeiro mayor Cesar Maia, September 20, 2007

The Diário do Grande ABC (metro São Paulo, Brazil) reports: State public safety statistics for the São Paulo periferia were off. Way off.

See also

• “Deconstructing Alckmin”: Books Cooked on São Paulo Bank Robberies
• “Resistance Followed By Death”: Truths, Partial Truths and Statistics

A Secretaria Estadual de Segurança Pública divulgou errado 12.998 dados criminais no Grande ABC durante três anos, entre 2004 e 2006. Os números equivocados referem-se a quatro tipos de crimes: homicídios, furto, roubo e furto e roubo de veículos. Segundo o governo, os erros foram causados por interpretação equivocada dos casos no registro das ocorrências nas delegacias.

The state public security secretary published erronenous data on 12,998 criminal incidents in Greater ABC over three years, from 2004 to 2006. The incorrect numbers refer to four categories of crime: Homicides, theft, robbery and grand theft auto. According to the government, the errors were caused by incorrect interpretations of incident reports filed with police precincts.

A confusão foi descoberta durante revisão das estatísticas feita pela CAP (Coordenadoria de Análise e Planejamento), departamento ligado à secretaria, em cada um dos 645 municípios do Estado. O trabalho começou no início do ano.

The mix-up was discovered during a review of the statistics from each of the state’s 645 townships by CAP, the Analysis and Planning Coordinator, an office inside the SSP. The review started early this year.

Grande parte dos números errados nas sete cidades da região foi superestimado, conforme dados atualizados disponibilizados quinta-feira.

A large portion of the erroneous numbers for the seven cities of the ABC region were overestimates, according to data made available last Thursday.

Por exemplo, os furtos em Santo André, em 2004, haviam sido divulgados como 8.767, sendo que, após a recontagem, esse número ficou em 7.115.

For example, 8,767 cases of theft had been disclosed in Santo André, in 2004, but after the recount, the number was stated as 7,115.

Overstated by 23%, I make that.

Confusão – As principais confusões foram identificadas em quantidade de furtos, roubos e furtos e roubos de veículos. Esses três, acrescidos de assassinatos, são os únicos crimes divulgados pelo Estado por município. A incidência de outras ocorrências como latrocínio (roubo seguido de morte), estupro e roubo de carga não é revelada.

Confusion: The principal mix-ups had to do with the quantity of thefts, robberies and vehicle thefts and robberies. These three crimes, along with homicides, are the only categories for which statistics are published by the State on a town-by-town basis. The incidence of other crimes, such as homicide in the course of a robbery, rape, and hijacking of cargo, are not published.

A cidade da região onde houve mais equívocos foi Santo André, com 6.318 dados errados. A segunda colocada foi São Bernardo, com 4.111.

The city with the most errors was Santo André, where the numbers were off by 6,138. The second was São Bernardo, with 4,111.

A reportagem solicitou entrevista com o coordenador da CAP, o sociólogo Túlio Kahn, mas, de acordo com a secretaria, ele não poderia falar sexta-feira sobre o assunto por causa de compromissos.

This newspaper sought out CAP director Túlio Kahn, for comment, but the SSP said he was not available Friday due to previous engagement.

Na avaliação da secretaria, os erros na região já eram esperados após a descoberta dos equívocos gerais do Estado no início de agosto. Somente em seqüestro, roubo a banco, de veículos e de carga, mais de 16 mil ocorrências foram registradas de maneira errada nos três anos. Segundo a Pasta, houve orientação nas delegacias para que os equívocos não ocorram mais.

In the evaluation of the SSP, the errors in the region were anticipated after the discovery in August of statewide statistical errors. In the areas of kidnapping, bank robbery, loadjacking and carjacking alone, more than 16,000 incidents were incorrectly recorded in a three-year period. According to the SSP, police precincts have received guidance so that these errors will not longer occur.

São Paulo: “PCC Planned New Offensive”

A year ago, in the aftermath of the PM-PCC Wars, a TV Globo news team is kidnapped, and Globo airs a statement from the kidnappers to secure their release. I have subtitled this somewhere but cannot find it at the moment.

PCC preparava nova onda de ataques em SP, diz PF (Estado de S. Paulo): The PCC criminal faction was preparing a new wave of attacks in the region, says federal police.

SÃO PAULO – A apreensão, nesta sexta-feira, de armamentos e drogas que seriam repassados ao Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC), revela que a facção criminosa estava preparando uma nova onda de ataques, que previa inclusive a derrubada de um helicóptero Águia, da Polícia Militar, na região de Ribeirão Preto. A informação foi repassada pela Polícia Federal, que teria rastreado ordens saídas de cadeias onde estão os principais líderes do PCC.

The seizure on Friday of weapons and drugs that were allegedly to be passed on to the First Commando of the Capital (PCC) reveals that the criminal faction was preparing a new wave of attacks in which it planned to shoot down a military police Águia [“eagle”] helicopter in the Ribeirão Preto area. The information is from the federal police, which says it intercepted orders coming out of the prisons where the PCC leadership is incarcerated.

São Paulo: “Beer Saved Me From Death-Squad Massacre”

“The Girls of ABC” was a popular period comedy of a season or two back. Sort of a light comedy, except for the subplot involving a racist death squad.

The Diário do Grande ABC interviews a survivor of “the worst massacre in the state this year.”

ABC is

uma região industrial formada por sete municípios da Região Metropolitana de São Paulo: Santo André (A); São Bernardo do Campo (B); São Caetano do Sul (C); Diadema (D); Mauá ; Ribeirão Pires e; Rio Grande da Serra.

An industrial region formed by seven townships in the São Paulo metropolitan area … 

Uma cerveja salvou a vida da dona do bar onde ocorreu a maior chacina do ano no Estado, sábado, em Ribeirão Pires. Testemunha do extermínio de oito pessoas, a sobrevivente diz não ter dúvidas quanto ao envolvimento de policias e tem medo de morrer.

A beer saved the life of the woman who owns the bar where the worst massacre of the year took place on Saturday, in Ribeirão Pires. A witness to the execution of eight persons, the survivor says she has no doubt as to the involvement of police in the incident, and fears for her life.

São Paulo: A Criminal Middle Finger As The Buses Burned?

Alckmin’s state public safety secretary: Dancing, drumming, digressing and flipping lawmakers the bird?

MP aceita denúncia de deputados contra Saulo de Abreu: A group of 24 state lawmakers — what are there names? — sue the former state public security chief for criminal desacato — “contempt of Congress,” sort of, although with a wider range of applications, I think you could say — during a heated debate in the aftermath of the PM-PCC wars of May 2006.

A denúncia se refere a ato ocorrido em 6 de junho de 2006, na Assembléia Legislativa, quando Saulo Castro foi convocado pela Comissão de Segurança Pública da casa para falar sobre a crise na segurança pública no Estado e dos ataques atribuídos ao PCC (Primeiro Comando da Capital). Se condenado, Saulo poderá pegar pena de detenção de até três anos e meio.

The charge has to do with a June 6, 2006 event in the state assembly, when Saulo [de] Castro was summoned by the Public Safety Committee to testify about the crisis of public safety and the attacks attributed to the PCC criminal organization. If found guilty, he could get up to three and a half years in jail.

No despacho, o procurador alega que Saulo “ultrapassou as fronteiras da veemência e da ironia toleráveis, ensaiou passos de danças e batucou na mesa enquanto era ouvido, desviou propositadamente, em algumas oportunidades, o olhar de seu interlocutor, chegou a erguer acintosamente o dedo médio”.

In the complaint, the state prosecutor alleges that Saulo “surpassed the acceptable limits of vehemence and irony, broke out into dance steps and drummed on the table during his testimony, willfully distracted [avoided?], at times, the gaze of his questioner, and even raised his middle finger contemptuously.

São Paulo: “New Top Cop is Veteran of DOPS, Miami SWAT”

DOPS São Paulo is now a museum.

The legal news and information service Consultor Jurídico — there seems to be healthy competition in this area, and the competing services are all pretty darn good — reports: New São Paulo police chief is a former DOPS inspector.

DOPS was the notorious political police, in whose dungeons over by the Estação da Luz people tended to commit astonishing suicides worthy of Chinese circus acrobats. Or more often simply disappear, with phony cover stories provided by the Folha de S. Paulo‘s afternoon tabloid.

Senator Tuma of São Paulo is also a former DOPS official, although his Wikipedia autohagiography by proxy somehow omits to mention the fact.

O novo delegado-geral da Polícia Civil de São Paulo é Maurício José Lemos Freire. Ele assume a vaga deixada, nesta segunda-feira (10/9), por Mário Jordão Toledo Leme, que pediu demissão.

The new chief of the state judicial police in São Paulo is Maurício José Lemos Freire. He takes over the post vacated on September 10 by Mário Jordão Toledo Leme, who resigned.

Os motivos da demissão não são conhecidos. Jordão afirma que deixou o cargo por motivos pessoais. No entanto, há informações de que ele teria se desentendido com o secretário de Segurança Pública, Ronaldo Marzagão.

The reasons for the resignation are unknown. Jordão says he left his post for personal reasons. However, there is information that he had a falling out with the state secretary of public safety, Ronaldo Marzagão.

A Agência Estado informa que o governador paulista, José Serra, estaria descontente com o desempenho da Segurança Pública do Estado, principalmente por causa das repetidas denúncias de corrupção envolvendo policiais civis.

The Estado news agency reports that the state governor, José Serra, is unhappy with his public safety department, principally because of repeated charges of police corruption.

My impression was that Serra was lobbied heavily to keep the public safety team of his predecessor, but resisted and named his own team. Soon after, crooked cop busts started happening. Which seems like a good thing. Serra is one of the notable chorus of governors singing from the hymnal of “we are going to bork corruption no matter who gets hurt.” You hardly ever read about it in the papers, but there really does seem to be a nonpartisan consensus that this is the sort of thing that politicians are going to say. I believe I remember hearing Neves of Minas Gerais saying something similar recently, for example: “I am not going to politicize this issue.”

In São Paulo, a mob lawyer was arrested recently in possession of a spreadsheet indicating payoffs to something like 85% to 90% of São Paulo police precincts. By gambling mafiosos.

The deputy mayor of the Butantã subprefecture is also suspected of taking bribes to keep bingos and slot machines operating on his turf. There are rumblings about Matarazzo of the Sé subprefecture as well. Yes, one of those Matarazzos.

DENARC officers reportedly extorted the Colombian drug lord, “Chupeta,” to the tune of a million bucks, rather than busting him.

Notes on the Brazilian New Economy: NMM(-TV)SNB(B)CNNBS

Notes on the Brazilian New Economy

“Brazil is insulated from the global panic”; Wagner Monte on narcocops in the Green Zone of Rio; behind the scenes at Google Brasil.

São Paulo Big Digs: Sounding Out the Sons of the Smoking Hole

MP-SP quer explicações sobre solo na rua dos Pinheiros: Speaking of pointless rules that stand in the way of progress — the principal talking point of the Monkeyman in defense of his scientific reputation after being borked on embezzlement and smuggling charges — the Estadão reports that prosecutors have intervened once again in a São Paulo dig big, citing the public interest.

• “State prosecutor wants explanations on Pinheiros St. soil conditions”

See

• Sampa Diary: “Son of the Great Smoking Hole”

The state prosecutor’s office was also closely involved in the issue of the runway reforms at Congonhas airport prior to the TAM disaster on July 17. The two Big Digs have a contractor in common, in fact: OAS. (As you may recall, Veja magazine‘s war with the sex Senator began over a civil engineering and infrastructure investment bust.)

I think you could fairly say that many Brazilian engineers feel that faith-based engineering in the service of watered-cement cronyist contracting is a factor in Brazil’s scandalous infrastructure collapses. See

• Shocked! Shocked! Brazilian Contractors Rewarded for Failure!
• “In Hell, The Engineers Are Brazilian and the Musicians Are German”
• Alagoas Techie: Rambling on Elections Wreck

(Of course, we gringos now know that we are not immune to scandalous infrastructure collapses ourselves. Entropy may swirl the other way in the antipodes, but it still tends inexorably to produce the “half-sunk a shatter’d visage lies” effect. There is an interesting W$J Washington Wire blog entry on a related topic today:

• Washington Wire: Safer Runways?)

SÃO PAULO – Antes do reinício das escavações do Metrô de São Paulo na área da rua dos Pinheiros, onde surgiu uma cratera há 9 dias, a Promotoria de Habitação e Urbanismo do Ministério Público determinou que seja apresentado um relatório com análise preliminar do afundamento do solo, ocorrido entre as ruas Fradique Coutinho e Mateus Grou.

Before resuming excavation on the São Paulo subway in the area of Pinheiros St., where a crater formed 9 days ago, the Public Ministry’s Housing and Urban Planning Office ruled that report must be submitted containing a preliminary study of the soil subsidence that occurred between Fradique Coutinho and Mateus Grou.

Some of our favorite bargain shopping spots are on the Fradique Coutinho.

Oof! Maluf Celebrates a Decade in the Dock

Maluf and Daily Show “fake news” precursor (and Max Headroom imitator, to a degree) Marcelo Tas from a never-aired pilot for TV Globo’s Fantástico newsmagazine, 199x.

The problem with the [striking female public-school teachers is not that they are not well-paid; it is that they are not well-laid. –Paulo Maluf.

Ação contra Maluf e Pitta faz ‘aniversário’ de 10 anos: Lawsuit against Maluf and Pitta “celebrates” 10th anniversary, reports the Estadão.

On Maluf — who will feature in this week’s NMM(-TV)SNB(B)CNNBS Tupimedia Zeitgeist reel, in progress, see also:

• Rohter on Maluf: The Blind Eye Misreading the Blind Eye
• “The Curriculum Vitae of Paulo Maluf”

Celso Pitta is one of those Latin American “innovations in public administration” Harvard grads. If you catch my drift.

SÃO PAULO – Completa nesta quarta-feira, 8, dez anos a primeira grande ação judicial contra os ex-prefeitos Paulo Maluf (1993-1996) e Celso Pitta (1997-2000), por supostos atos de improbidade na emissão de Letras Financeiras do Tesouro Municipal para quitação de precatórios. Até hoje, porém, Justiça não decidiu se Maluf e Pitta são culpados ou não.

August 8 was the tenth anniversary of the first major judicial proceeding against former mayors Paulo Maluf (1993-1996) and Celso Pitta (1997-2000), for alleged acts of administrative improbity in the issuance of municipal treasury notes to satisfy a court order to repay debt. To this day, however, the courts have not decided whether the two mayors are guilty or not.  

O processo está no Superior Tribunal de Justiça (STJ), que vai julgar recurso especial e decidir se extingue a ação, como pede a defesa, ou determina o retorno dos autos à primeira instância, como sentenciou o Tribunal de Justiça, para realização de perícia.

The case is currently with the [federal appeals court, hierarchically comparable our district courts of appeals, I think you could kind of say] which will rule on a special appeal and decide whether to extinguish the case, as the defense is asking, or return it to a court of the first instance, as the state supreme court ordered, for the conducting of an expert investigation.

São Paulo Diary: 111 Is the Angriest Number at Local Theater

… we must dare to be free, even as we weep at the pain of those who offer up their own flesh to the hot steel, as have the police who have fallen these last months, watering the soil with blood and honor so that the seeds of peace may be sown. — Lt. Col. Mário Sérgio de Brito Duarte, former BOPE commander and current head of strategic planning for Rio’s state public security department. See Rio: BOPE Blogs the Alemão.

… a man from the group in the front row shouted: “111 is a Kabbalistic number! 111,000 should die!” Next, the skinhead gentleman, wearing a vest decorated with a skull, sat on the edge of the state and addressed the audience: “Anyone here have a relative murdered by these criminals?”

Luiz Zanin writing for the Estado de S. Paulo, notes a Netroots campaign against a local theater production based on Drauzio Varella’s best-selling memoir of the Carandiru massacure.

These days, Varella, who worked as the prison doctor at the time and wrote a memoir of his experiences, is sort of the Dr. Sanjay Gupta of the Globo network.

Tenho andado muito preocupado com a guinada à extrema-direita de parte considerável da sociedade brasileira. O e-mail que recebi agora há pouco, e reproduzo abaixo, confirma esses temores. Os eventos que ele relata lembram os tempos da ditadura militar, quando artistas do espetáculo Roda Viva foram espancados por membros do CCC (Comando de Caça aos Comunistas). Ainda não se chegou a isso. Mas o clima não é bom. Leiam abaixo e comprovem por vocês mesmos.

I have been worrrying a lot lately about the swerve to the extreme right by a considerable part of Brazilian society. The e-mail I rceived just now, which I reproduce below, confirms these fears. The events that it relates recall the era of the military dictatorship, when performers from the play Roda Viva were beaten by members of the CCC (the “communist-hunting commando”). It has not yet gotten to that point, but the atmosphere is not a good one. Read and see for yourself.

Throughout the 1970s, a group of Army intelligence officers operating outside the law, but under cover of the impunity underwritten by AI-5 and the Amnesty Law, conducted a bombing campaign against theaters, publishers and even the Rio bar association.

For our friends, anything; for our enemies, the law.

In Sâo Paulo, a CCC group organized inside Mackenzie University also burned down the University of São Paulo’s Faculty of Philosophy in Higienópolis.

SALMO 91 TEVE SESSÃO TUMULTUADA NO ÚLTIMO SÁBADO

“Psalm 91” has performance disrupted on Saturday

Com casa lotada, o espetáculo Salmo 91 (dirigido por Gabriel Villela, uma adaptação do jornalista Dib Carneiro Neto para o best seller Estação Carandiru, de Drauzio Varella, em cartaz no Teatro do SESC Santana) teve uma sessão tensa no sábado, 21 de julho.

Playing to a full house, the play Psalm 91 (directed by Gabriel Villela from an adaptation by Dib Carneiro Neto of Varella’s bestselling Carandiru Station, playing at the SESC Santana) experienced tense moments on July 21.

O clima de desconforto se deu devido à presença da senhora Karina Florido Rodrigues, de 30 anos, que se declarou “ex-assessora do deputado Coronel Ubiratan Guimarães”, o policial que comandou o massacre que resultou na morte de 111 presos no Carandiru, há 15 anos. Na semana passada, ela visitou o blog do Salmo 91 e escreveu um longo texto, sem ter visto o espetáculo, tachando-o de “peça de teatro fazendo apologia ao crime”.

The climate was due to the presence of Karina Florido Rodrígues, 30, who declared herself “a former aide to state assemblyman Col. Ubiratan Guimarães,” the police official who commanded the massacre that killed 111 prisoners at Carandiru Prison 15 years ago. Last week, she visited the production’s Web log and left a long comment, without ever having seen the play, calling it “a play that apologizes for crime.”

São Paulo Police Blotter: “Equal Justice for Some”?

Globo video, too, lacks something in the way of equal access — my platform, according to its server-side logic, is too inferior to view it.

Time will tell whether the emergence of the quasi government is to be viewed as a symptom of decline in our democratic government, or a harbinger of a new, creative management era where the purportedly artificial barriers between the governmental and private sectors are breached as a matter of principle. — Kevin R. Kosar, “The Quasi Government: Hybrid Organizations with Both Government and Private Sector Legal Characteristics” (Congressional Research Service, February 13, 2007)

Delegado é suspeito de pedir R$ 40 mil a bancos: From the G1/Globo police blotter, a sidebar to a federal police investigation of a credit-card cloning operation.

Um delegado de São Paulo é suspeito de pedir por escrito R$ 40 mil a dois bancos. Ele será investigado.

A São Paulo police investigator is suspected of demanding R$40,000 in writing from two banks. He will be investigated.

Os pedidos foram feitos em papel timbrado da polícia e assinados pelo delegado Ricardo Guanaes Domingues. Os documentos foram endereçados a dois grandes bancos do país, cada um pedindo R$ 20 mil.

The requests were made on police letterhead and signed by Ricard Guanaes Domingues. The documents were addressed to two major national banks, each demanding R$20,000.

O valor teria sido gasto durante uma investigação. O texto se refere à prisão de uma quadrilha de clonadores de cartões magnéticos em junho, em Osasco, na Grande São Paulo.

The sum was allegedly to be spent on an investigation. The text refers to the June arrest of a gang that cloned magnetic bank cards, in Osasco, metro São Paulo.

Os dois ofícios fazem parte do inquérito policial, que já foi encaminhado à Justiça. O pedido de dinheiro surpreendeu o promotor que acompanha o caso. Ele quer que o delegado seja investigado por crime de corrupção passiva.

The two requests are part of a police case file that was forwarded to the courts. The request for money surprised the prosecutor in charge of the case. He wants the police investigator investigated for passive corruption.

How TV Globo (Brazil) Covered Those Fascinating Tropical Racketeering Busts, Part I: The Quickening

How TV Globo (Brazil) Covered Fascinating Tropical Racketeering Busts, Part I:

Answer: they just used footage preproduced by official federal police flacks and overdubbed it with narration by the ghost of Orson Welles, with a spooky, cheesy videogame soundtrack and leaked wiretap snippets. But the case itself is of great interest, so the more archival footage we can put on the record, the merrier. Part II to come.

Sharp Threads: Amorim on Matarazzo and Mangabeira

Matarazzo explains his plan to purge downtown São Paulo of the poor and unwashed.

P(R)F DESEMBARCA NA CORRUPÇÃO DE SP: Mr. Amorim of Conversa Afiada (“idle” but also “sharp” but also “threaded” conversation) is a little too sharp-tongued for my taste these days. And I am a pretty sharp-tongued guy myself.

On my blog, at least, where I can unwind and indulge all my prose-stylistic vices.

See Dantas: Prince of Darkness Invisible, for example. Amorim was one of the journalists allegedly bugged by Daniel Dantas as part of a Hewlett-Packard-style corporate espionage dirty war over control of Internet backbone provider Brasil Telecom.

He tends to get a little excited about that whole affair, then. Naturally. But still, a slight caveat lector is warranted.

Even so, Amorim does have a distinguished resume, and seems to have a fairly wide following among readers of the growing stable of iG — the former “Internet Grátis” free ISP and portal — blog pundits, so it is interesting to check in on the line he is taking on the events of the day.

Today: Roberto Mangabeira Unger and Andréa Matarazzo, two eminent Tupi neo(con)-Victorians.

Also interesting: Amorim adds his voice to the position that Chávez’s borking of RCTV, while understandable and  possibly even desirable (or not), was not done properly under Venezuelan law. I am studying that, which has the makings of an emergent manufactured consensus. See also Brazil: “How to Vaccinate Our Media Against Chavism.”

But first, the continuing post-(non)mortem on the newly undead Minister of the Future!

Para derrubar o Presidente Lula, o Estadão é capaz de fazer o que nenhum órgão de mídia conservadora (e golpista) fez: associou o nome de Daniel Dantas aos motivos por que o Presidente Lula não deveria nomear Mangabeira Unger Ministro do Futuro.

The Estado de S. Paulo, in order to help overthrow President Lula, is capable of doing what no other conservative (and coup-plotting) news organization has done: It associated the name of Daniel Dantas to the reasons why Lula ought not nominate Mangabeira Unger as Minister of the Future.

São Paulo Diary: Government as Cosmetic Surgery

“What is the greatest pride of the São Paulo native today?” Top answer: “Stick a fork in it, this sucker is done.” Second: “Cultural ferment and bohemia.” Third: “The power of money.” Fourth: “The Mayor’s Clean City law.”

In Rio, the problem was never the Red Command, but the “Blue Command,” the military police. The problem is police corruption. There is this impression that crime is high in Brazil. It’s not. Police corruption is high. Criminality flows from the corruption of the police. When the police stop being corrupt, crime goes down. When the kids [interviewed in Falcão: Children of the Traffic] say they pay part of the cop’s salary, that’s true. The traffic, in reality, is a partner of the Brazilian police. — Former Rio police chief Hélio Luz, in an interview with Zero Hora, May 2007

And so is the corporate media, astonishingly.

SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL — Columnist Xico Sá of no mínimo‘s Ponte Aérea SP makes some points that add to my own recent observations about the state government’s absurd effort to rebrand a repressive invasion of shantytowns in the northern district of the city using the crassest of “happy talk” marketing methods.

In São Paulo, government spends less time governing that it does marketing the notion that it is governing.

See Public Security In Brazil: Reality X Government by Press Release.

Dubbed “Operation Saturation,” the operation disappeared from the news for a month or so and was was relaunched, in “reloaded form,” with the same name as the city’s effort to emulate Madrid’s “White Nights” cultural festival.

After the Virada Cultural — which publicly and notoriously, in the full glare of the media spotlight, produced another in a long series of truculent beatdowns by the military police “shock trooop” — they decided to rebrand it as the Virada Social.

See São Paulo: Operation Saturation, Reloaded.

As part of the marketing push behind this approach to public safety, the Estadão recently trotted out an anthropologist from the Viva Rio NGO to promote the view that Brazil’s military presence in Haiti, as the lead element in MINUTAH, has valuable lessons to teach Brazil’s largest cities.

See “Haiti É Aqui”: Embedded Reporter on the Army in Rio.

The anthropologist — whose foundation is funded by USAID and other foreign government aid agencies, as well as corporate donors and the Rio de Janeiro goverment — hailed the strategy of combining military occupation of the Bantustans with “rapid social actions” — such as handing out condoms or a monthly visit from a mobile dental-care clinic.

The political promise by governments at all levels, however, has been to replace repressive policing with community policing practices that comply with modern standards and respect human rights and due process of law. The federal government has ratified international conventions to that effect. See

• Cabral: The Caveirão is History
• Rio: Still Rolling in the Tanks

TV Globo, meanwhile, continues to hammer on a single note: The shantytowns of Rio de Janeiro are Baghdad’s Sadr City and the Sunni Triangle of Iraq.

This coordinated media campaign, also uses happy-talk marketing methods to defend maintaining such practices as the indefinite occupation of the (militia-infiltrated) Complexo Alemão in Rio de Janeiro — which happens to coincide with the showcase Pan American games.

Xico:

A polícia de SP copiou o marketing do camburão adotado pela Polícia Federal e saiu prendendo quem encontrou pela frente. Num só dia, a operação Strike –até o batismo é a cara das ações da PF- enjaulou 2.500, com um planejamento publicitário nunca dantes visto por estas plagas. Menos de 24 horas depois teve que soltar a metade dos lambaris -não havia motivo para prisão ou foram liberados mediante pagamento de pequenas fianças.

The SP police have copied the “SUV marketing” adopted by the federal police and are out arresting anyone they find in front of them. In a single day, Operation Strike — even the name is a clone of a PF Operation — jailed 2,500, accompanied by a publicity campaign such as never before been seen on these shores. Less than 24 hours later they had to release half the skels — there was no probable cause to arrest them or they got out by paying miniscule amounts of bail.

São Paulo: More Mafia Spreadsheets!

Bingo Jabaquara, Southern Zone, São Paulo. Jumping-off point for Santos. Source: Fotoagência NMM(-TV)SNBCNNBS-Tabajara (me).

Among the bribe recipients listed in the ledger were the Federal Police, the Organized Crime Division and the State Judicial Police.

R$ 205 mil por mês para pagar propina: as the top headline in the Estado de S. Paulo daily continues to bang the gong on Lula’s “Billy-beer” moment — the federal police report on the incident clears the president of involvement in a lobbying flap involving his brother — it runs it side by side on the front page with ongoing coverage of Operation Themis — judges and law enforcement paid off to protect illegal gambling mafias.

See also

• Pela Internet: How Rio One-Armed Bandit King Paid Off Cops
• Bingo! Hurricane Blows Up More Mafia Spreadsheets

The message that “all politicians are crooks” is promoted most heavily in Brazil by the crookedest politicians, I have noticed. Particularly those who control or suborn media companies.

It is a FUD strategy, pure and simple.

I am losing respect for the Estadão — thought not its non-Moonie reporter corps, mind you. The Estadão sends more editorial managers to the Opus Dei-sponsored Masters [sic] em Jornalismo course than any other publication in Brazil, I read, however. See Dei O, Dei O; or, Deus Dará.

A nice, round number: The bribe fund gets R$50 per illegal gambling machine per month.

Suspeito de entregar a policiais civis propinas para permitir o funcionamento de caça-níqueis na Grande São Paulo, o advogado Jamil Chokr arrecadou só em abril R$ 205 mil de donos de máquinas. Na contabilidade dele, anotações feitas em francês indicam que parte desse valor foi distribuído a 15 “libellés” (destinatários). Entre eles estão a Polícia Federal, o Departamento de Investigações Sobre o Crime Organizado (Deic) e o Departamento de Polícia Judiciária da Capital (Decap).

Suspected of paying bribes to Civil Police agents to permit the operation of electronic gambling machine parlors in Greater São Paulo, lawyer Jamil Chokr took in R$205,000 in April from gambling machine operators. In his accounting records, annotations made in French indicate that part of this sum was distributed to 15 “libellés” (payees). Among them were the Federal Police, the Organized Crime Division and the State Judicial Police.

Sampa Diary: The Phone Co. and the Phony Co.

Vigilante consumerdom: angry Argentines spank the Spaniards. Source: Iconoclastas.

The Spanish Telefónica (Telefônica in Brazil) has a monopoly on fixed line telephony in São Paulo.

A Telefônica employee, you may recall, was recently arrested for tipping off wiretap targets in Operation Themis — busting judges who sold verdicts favorable to gambling-parlor operators and to businesses seeking tax credits. See In São Paulo Corruption Case, Telefónica Is The Telco That Dare Not Speak Its Name.

Cable News Network, S.A., which is rebroadcast in Peru by the Spanish behemoth Telefónica, sued the Spaniards in 2001, accusing them of trying to restrict freedom of expression, in a case linked to bribes paid to media owners by the Fujimori government.

See also YouTube and PeruTube: Media and Monstrosities in the Trans-Andean TAZ.

In Sâo Paulo, Telefônica outsources its field service to local contractors.

It consistently leads the nation in consumer complaints over shoddy service, according to the consumer watchdog PROCON — particularly over the conduct of its call center operators.

See Next Meme for SLAPPing Down: ‘I H8 Telefonica’ and São Paulo: Debt Slave Takes Villains of the YouTube Blockade to Kafka’s ‘The Trial.’

So when someone within six degrees of separation of the NMMist had their phone line go down recently, the Telefônica field force militias arrived.

The field force explained that, because the problem was external to the premises, the service would be free. If it were on the premises, the customer would pay a fee.

However, the field force added, there was no guarantee that the dilapidated external facilities would not go down again in the next wave of exploding AES-Eletropaulo transformers.

The field force then helpfully offered to make a side deal: Pay an additional (cash) fee of R$40 a month and the field force would give special attention to the outside facilities in the neighborhood, guaranteeing a decent response time and a shorter service interruption.