Svensk affärsman häktad i brasilianska muthärvan

Operation Car Wash (Portuguese: Operação Lava Jato) is an ongoing criminal investigation by the Federal Police of Brazil, Curitiba Branch. It was initially judicially commanded by Judge Sérgio Moro, and in 2019 by Judge Luiz Antonio Bonat.Initially a money laundering investigation, it has expanded to cover allegations of corruption at Petrobras, where executives allegedly accepted bribes in return for awarding contracts to construction firms at inflated prices. This criminal scheme was initially known as "Petrolão" (Portuguese for "big oil") because the scandal involved the state-controlled oil company. The investigation is called "Operation Car Wash" because it was first uncovered at a car wash in Brasília. It has included more than a thousand warrants for search and seizure, temporary and preventive detention, and plea bargain coercive measures. The aim of these is to ascertain the extent of a money laundering scheme, estimated in 2015 (by the Regional Superintendent of the Federal Police of Parana State) at R$6.4–42.8 billion (US$2–13 billion) embezzlement of Petrobras funds.At least eleven other countries, mostly in Latin America, were involved, and the Brazilian company Odebrecht was deeply implicated.The scandal grew in part because the investigation challenged the impunity of politicians and business leaders that had prevailed until then. Structural corruption in the political and economic system, no longer tolerated or accepted. It was initially thought this change was made possible because of the independence of the judiciary. However in June, 2019, documents were leaked to The Intercept which showed Judge Sergio Moro, who oversaw Operation Car Wash, directing prosecutors' legal and media strategies against ex-President Lula da Silva, and passing on ‘advice, investigative leads, and inside information to the prosecutors’. The leaks show the prosecutors themselves in extensive discussions on how to prevent ex-President Lula's re-election, planning to 'pray together' for that outcome, and discussing the perceived weakness of their evidence. (See Leaked Conversations, below.) Judge Sergio Moro's Operation Car Wash investigation indicted some well-known politicians, including former presidents Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff, though after The Intercept's revelations, da Silva's conviction seems to be in significant doubt. It succeeded because of ‘rewarded collaboration’ and the strategy of first targeting businesspeople, then using their statements against politicians.