Operation Car Wash

A Financial Times Book to Read in 2022
Operation Car Wash is the inside story of two Brazilian Federal Police officers who found themselves at the centre of the biggest corruption scandal in history; uncovering a web of political and corporate racketeering which would lead them all the way to the arrest and imprisonment of the nation's President.
Through engrossing first-hand testimony, Pontes and Anselmo recount the uphill battle faced by the Federal Police in apprehending Brazil's white-collar criminals, in a country where the war on drugs has become a convenient distraction for the politicians and businessmen extracting billions of dollars from the public purse. A historical record that reads like a political police thriller, Operation Car Wash is also a warning to the world: demonstrating how easily institutionalized crime can take root in a nation, and how difficult it can be to eradicate.

Jorge Pontes is a graduate from the FBI National Academy. He spent almost thirty years working for the Federal Police-first as an agent and later as a police chief-both nationwide and abroad, and devoted most of his career to the creation and implementation of units specializing in fighting environmental crime. He was an instructor at the National Police Academy and, in 2006, received the British Parliament Green Apple Award for his operations in the Brazilian Amazon. He was Regional Superintendent for Pernambuco, coordinator-general and elected member of Interpol's executive committee, and is former director of teaching and statistics at the National Public Security Department (Senasp), under the Ministry of Justice.

Foreword
Professor Robert I. Rotberg
1.The arrest of Marcelo Odebrecht
INSTITUTIONALIZED CRIME
2.From Narcotics to Environmental Crime
NEXT STOP: THE FBI
INTERNAL RESISTANCE
3.The Embryo of Operation Car Wash
FROM THE "TRUCKER'S KIT" TO FINANCIAL CRIME
THE FAKTOR "FACULTY"
NOTHING WOULD BE THE SAME AGAIN
4.The Diversion of the Federal Police
SKEWING PRIORITIES
HEAVIER WORKLOAD, FEWER AGENTS
5.From Organized to Institutionalized Crime
THE OFFICIAL PLATFORM
THE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT'S CHIEF OF STAFF
THE PARADOX OF THE FP UNDER LULA
THE INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF CORRUPTION
WHITE-COLLAR CRIME AND WEBS FOR SMALL INSECTS
6.The Investigation of Lula
AN EXPLOSIVE WIRE-TAP
THE ARREST
7. Capitalism, the Brazilian Way
AN INSTITUTIONALIZED ATTACK ON DEMOCRACY
THE ORIENT EXPRESS EFFECT
RAIN HOURS
THE NON-CRIME
8.Jewelry, Racketeers, and Bad Checks - a State on the Rampage
CABRAL'S RIO -MEGA-EVENTS AND MEGA-CORRUPTION
A GLIMPSE OF THE WHALE - A CASE IN PERNAMBUCO
THE POLICE CHIEF IN THE BOW TIE
9.The Obstruction of Federal Police Investigations
THE TENSEST DAY
THE CAYMAN DOSSIER
INSTITUTIONAL LEAKS
DILMA'S PHANTOM E-MAIL
ONE HUNDRED AND ELEVEN DAYS OF MIXED SIGNALS
10.Political Appointments
THE "CLEANING CREWS" AND "RESCUE TEAMS"
THE KING'S FIFTH
11.The Current Role of the Federal Police
THE LAST TARGET OF OPERATION CAR WASH: THE JUDICIARY
A SYSTEM MADE NOT TO WORK
INSTITUTIONALIZED CRIME AS A THREAT TO THE NATION'S DEVELOPMENT
12.Proposals for the Future
Postscript: About a Plane
Afterword: The Normalization of Malfeasance
Why it's so hard to dismantle institutionalized crime in Brazil
Luís Roberto Barroso