Prosecutors in São Paulo have charged 19 people with building a clandestine financial network they describe as a "crime bank", allegedly used to launder money for members and associates of the PCC (Primeiro Comando da Capital), Brazil's largest criminal faction. Folha de S.Paulo reports the complaint was filed on Monday (14), while Metrópoles dates the filing to Friday (11). The defendants face charges of criminal organization and money laundering, among other crimes depending on each person's role.
According to the Gaeco, the state prosecutors' organized crime unit, the scheme ran at least from 2019 to 2025. Its main service was a cash-for-wire-transfer swap: the group took in cash it knew came from crime and, for a fee, sent back an equivalent bank transfer through its own accounts, front men or shell companies. The flow also ran in reverse, with bank funds converted into cash. Messages recovered from phones seized in the Recidere and Bazaar operations allegedly show the participants knew where the money came from and used that knowledge to set the discount charged on each transaction. The case stems from the Janus and Bazaar operations, which investigated illicit money flows and an alleged corruption scheme inside the São Paulo civil police; Metrópoles reports Janus was launched in July of this year.
In the complaint, the prosecutors describe the network as follows:
"a center of illicit financial services, or a true 'crime bank', made available to members and associates of the PCC to hide and disguise the origin, nature and ownership of assets and money from drug trafficking and other crimes".
From Car Wash to the PCC
According to G1, the Gaeco places three operators at the center of the structure: Cléber Azevedo dos Santos, Leonardo Meirelles, a fugitive, and Paulo Rogério Silva, known as "Paulo Barão". Prosecutors say all three had been implicated in earlier investigations and criminal cases and moved "amounts in the billions of reais". The indicted group also includes accountant Meire Bonfim da Silva Poza, who worked in schemes exposed by Operação Lava Jato, the Car Wash investigation launched in 2014; the complaint says she was paid R$ 70,000 a month by Azevedo for exclusive services, an amount she acknowledged in a February 2023 message. Raphael Flores Rodriguez, known as "Batata" and also a fugitive, was convicted in a Car Wash case; prosecutors say his role went beyond that of a client, including buying property in partnership with other operators and sharing cash stashes fed by criminal activity.
Named among the users of the service are Leonardo Monteiro Moja, known as "Léo do Moinho", in prison since August 6, 2024, and Alexandre Salles Brito, known as "Buiú", previously charged in Operation Fim da Linha over alleged links to the PCC and the bus company UpBus. Prosecutors count at least ten transactions totaling R$ 232,000 made for Buiú's benefit. Intercepted messages cited by Folha indicate Léo passed bank account details to one of the service providers, which received deposits in the tens of thousands of reais. Metrópoles reports that one company tied to the scheme moved more than R$ 28 million in six months, despite declaring annual revenue of about R$ 5 million.
Crime courts and police corruption
The complaint says the financial operators knew internal faction terms, took part in sessions of the so-called "tribunal do crime", the faction's internal dispute court, and at times used the organization's coercive power to settle their own property disputes. The structure also allegedly relied on corruption of public officials: the Gaeco says the indicted Marlon Antonio Fontana brokered and processed bribe payments. A full copy of the case file was sent to the military courts to open investigations into three São Paulo military police colonels named in the document, José Augusto Coutinho, Luiz Carlos Pereira Martins and an officer identified only as "Patricio". None of the three was charged in this action, and the document does not specify what crime each may have committed.
Rodrigo Antunes Benetti, the lawyer for Léo do Moinho, told Folha that "the innocence of Mr. Leonardo will be demonstrated" and disputed the accusations against his client, jailed since August 2024. Prosecutors also ask that the defendants pay, jointly, at least R$ 10 million in collective moral and social damages. The case now sits with the São Paulo courts, which must decide whether to accept the complaint and open a criminal trial; Folha reports there is no deadline for that ruling. Until a final verdict, all defendants are presumed innocent.