PF carry out operation to arrest accused of embezzling money from Petrobras

The Federal Police (PF) executed today (Dec. 17) four preventive arrest warrants and five search and seizure warrants against suspected of embezzling money from Petrobras contracts with the firm SBM Offshore, for renting platform and oil rigs. According to PF, since 1997, the defendants have used embezzled money to pay bribes.

The operation, called Black Blood, had been triggered before Operation Car Wash, but some of their targets are also being probed under Operation Car Wash. Even two of the arrest warrants have been issued to people who are already in prison in Curitiba. Warrants have also been served in Rio de Janeiro and Angra dos Reis (in the state of Rio).

The searches have been made in the houses of those investigated and in an oil exploration firm. The accused respond for crimes like tax evasion, currency evasion, embezzlement of public funds by money laundering, among other crimes.

According to a statement released by Public Prosecution Office, federal prosecutors Renato Oliveira and Leonardo Cardoso de Freitas have reported 12 people to justice, amid allegations of participating in the scheme.

Translated by Amarílis Anchieta