The Atlas bank granted a loan of US$6.5 million to a company linked to what is considered to be the largest drug trafficker in South America. Gilberto Suárez, indicted for money laundering, a client of Atlas, appears as a front man for the well-known narco “Cabeça Branca”. Shady commercial operations of the Zuccolillo bank are exposed. The prosecutor Lorena Ledesma, of the Specialized Unit in the fight against Drug Trafficking, points out in her brief that the Zuccolillo’s bank would have actively participated in operations for the “granting of loans to people who did not meet the financial profile, and thus way to contribute to the integration of sums of money resulting from drug trafficking.
Source: By Jorge Torres Romero and Cinthia Mora
By Jorge Torres Romero and Cinthia Mora
The Zuccolillo family bank is in the sights of the Prosecutor’s Office for apparently being part of the money laundering scheme of the powerful criminal Luiz Carlos da Rocha, alias “Branca Head”accused of laundering large amounts of dirty money from drug trafficking with the active participation of local financial entities.
Luiz Carlos da Rocha, alias “Cabeça Branca, is considered the biggest drug trafficker in South America. This narco has been imprisoned in Brazil since July 2017 for drug trafficking. According to the Paraguayan Prosecutor’s Office, he is the main injector of dirty money from drug trafficking in our country.
The also known as “Drug Baron” also has an open process in Paraguay since 2017 for money laundering and other crimes. There are about twenty people, allegedly proxies for the drug lord, prosecuted for injections of money of illicit origin through numerous companies in Paraguay.
Part of the brief by the prosecutor Lorena Ledesma in which she indicates that the banks, including Atlas (the one that granted the largest credit) made loans to people who did not meet the financial profile and thus contributed to the integration of sums of money product of drug trafficking.
According to the Public Ministry, Da Rocha carried out shady operations, through his proxies, with local financial entities, including the Zuccolillo family bank, which is now seeking to foreclose on a property that is being managed by Senabico, in the framework of a case against Cabeça Branca and his front men.
This is “Cielo Azul”, a 5,945-hectare farm located in the town of Paso Barreto, department of Concepción. It belongs to the firm Biocombustible Brasilero Biobras, whose president is Mr. Gilberto Suárez, who appears in the tax investigation as the alleged front man for drug trafficker Luiz Carlos da Rocha.
In November 2015, Suárez signed a contract with the Atlas bank for a line of credit with mortgage guarantee, for up to US$6,421,857.37, which was to be used through loans and other banking operations.
As a mortgage guarantee, the president of Biobras offered the farms of the “Cielo Azul” ranch, so after breaching the agreement, not having paid the bank, the Zuccolillo family resorted in 2019 to justice for foreclosure , however, the property in question was already in charge of Senabico and the justice ordered a prohibition measure to contract on it.
ATLAS BANK, IN THE SIGHTS OF THE PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE
In addition to not getting the money loaned to the company linked to the drug trafficker, the Atlas bank is now in the sights of the Public Ministry for its alleged involvement in money laundering.
In a note sent by the anti-drug prosecutor Lorena Ledesma to the deputy prosecutor Marco Alcaraz, it records the suspicion that exists regarding the active participation of financial entities in the activities of Cabeça Branca in the country, through the granting of loans to people who did not meet the financial profile and thus contributed to the integration of sums of money resulting from drug trafficking.
Prosecutor Ledesma concludes in her brief saying that “these facts would constitute sufficient evidence of the complicity of financial institutions in the integration and simulation of Luis Carlos Da Rocha’s assets in the financial system.”
In his brief, he states that the alleged narco figureheads agreed to high mortgage loans without having the transactional profile and the credit history for that purpose. The local banks, including Atlas, did not comply with the basic precepts of due diligence, since these clients were actually tractor drivers, farmers and laborers who maintained a labor dependency on the ranches linked to the case.
The investigator also emphasizes that these facts would constitute sufficient evidence of the complicity of the financial institutions in the integration and simulation of the assets of Luiz Carlos Da Rocha in the financial system, and that for this reason she informs her superior of these circumstances so that it begins an investigation against the banks involved, including the Atlas bank, of the Zuccolillo family.
Banco de Zuccolillo did business with a drug boss and now demands “Lavada Silver”.
▪️Banco Atlas granted millionaire credit to a company linked to a powerful Brazilian narco.
▪️ Cloudy commercial operations of Banco Atlas are exposed.#LaCajaNegraPy? pic.twitter.com/lbED5SinzE
– The Black Box (@CajaNegraPy) June 15, 2022
