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Ezequiel Antônio Castanha (right), who is
accused of illegally destroying tens of thousands of square kilometres of
Amazon forest, is arrested by federal police officers in Novo Progresso in the
northern state of Pará, Brazil. Photograph:
Stringer/Brazil/Reuters
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Brazil's
king of deforestation dethroned in drive to beat land clearers
Arrest of Ezekiel Castanha shines new spotlight on
financial crime and may help bring breakthrough in effort to protect Amazon
rainforest
Jonathan Watts in Rio de Janeiro
For most of the past six years, Ezequiel
Antônio Castanha had seemed a pillar of the community in the small Amazonian
city of Novo Progresso.
As the owner of a supermarket, hotel and car dealership, he provided more jobs
than anyone else. Outside his municipality, few had heard of him. Neighbours
described him as a “pessoa normal” (regular guy).
Today, however, the thick-set, middle-aged
man sits in jail with a notoriety acrossBrazil as a Tony Soprano-like character
whose businesses were used to launder money from one of the biggest land
clearance syndicates ever uncovered.
Castanha was arrested last weekend, along
with 15 associates, in what has been hailed as a major breakthrough for
environmental enforcement. The local media have described the detainee as the
“king of deforestation”. According to the environment ministry Ibama, he and
his gang were responsible for about 10% of deforestation in the Brazilian
Amazon last year.
“There has never been an investigation that
has uncovered so much land and money related to one group,” said Daniel
Azeredo, the lead prosecutor in the case. “If he remains in prison, we expect a
fall in deforestation rates. If he is released however, it is very likely that
he will continue with the same activities, due to a sense of impunity and of
course, because it is a very lucrative business.”
His arrest – after several months on the
run – already appears to have made a dramatic difference to land clearance
rates. Since last August, when the investigation – named Operation Castanheira
– was launched and a warrant was first issued for Castanha’s arrest,
deforestation around the BR-163 road has fallen by 65%, according to the
ministry.
This is positive news in an area that is
one the frontline of illegal land clearance. In the year up to July 2014, 1,872
square miles (4,848 sq km) of rainforest was destroyed in Brazil, about a
fifth of it along BR-163. Castanha is the main culprit, according to Ibama,
which estimates he and his associates caused forest destruction valued at 540m
reals (£130m)
Police wiretaps and court documents seen by
the Guardian reveal how the gang’s shell companies hired workers to illegally
occupy forest land near federal highway BR-163 in Pará. They then cut
down the trees, sold the logs and burn what is left so the properties look like
farmland and can be sold on to investors from the wealthy south-west of Brazil.
The syndicate registered the land under the
names of shell companies to provide a veneer of legality to the sales. Anyone
who challenged them was threatened with legal action or violence.
“They threatened to set fire to the Ibama
office, stole confiscated equipment and committed homicides. They are very
dangerous and highly organised,” said Luciano Evaristo, the Ibama official
responsible for this case.
Prosecutors said a separate murder
investigation involving Castanha was underway, but local people were too afraid
to talk. Regional police chief, Everaldo Eguchi, told domestic media that the
supermarket boss was “practically the owner of the city”.
Contacted by phone, many residents in Novo
Progresso – which has a population of 25,000 – were unwilling to comment. One
hotel worker, who asked to remain anonymous, said Castanho seemed like a
regular guy. “He didn’t seem particularly rich,” he said.
Justice is often hard to come by in this
Amazonian frontier, which is often described as Brazil’s wild west. For years,
satellite data has revealed the massive environmental crimes being committed
along the BR-163, but the perpetrators have continued their activities with
impunity. Until now, Castanha has ignored 47m reals (£10.2m) of fines for
forest destruction.
This time, however, the authorities hope
for more success by focussing on financial crimes, such as money laundering,
counterfeiting, tax evasion and fraud.
Forgery is a key part of the work of
“quadrilha de grileiros”, or squatter gangs, who leave newly faked documents in
cases full of insects so the papers appeared aged and authenticated.
With the addition of these white-collar
crimes, Castanha faces up to 46 years in prison.
Deforestation in the Amazon. Photograph:
luoman/Getty Images/iStockphoto
“This is a very important change,” said
Paulo Barreto from the environmental monitoring NGO Imazon. “Whenever the
government invests in infrastructure, the surrounding areas always fall victim
to squatter gangs because of real estate speculation. So it is very important
to have this more intelligent and integrated approach.”
Castanha’s lawyer says his client is
innocent, that the charges have been trumped up by those who envy his success,
and that he expects him to be granted bail at the first hearing on 11 March.
Many questions remain, including the
identities of Castanha’s business partners, political protectors and whether
the supermarket boss was really the top figure in the syndicate.
Ibama – which has come under fire in recent
years for losing the battle against illegal forest clearance – says the gang
was responsible for half of all deforestation in the BR-163 region, which
accounts for 20% of the total in Brazil. Yet only 30 square miles
(79.1 sq km) was in Castanha’s name – a significant area, but only a fraction
of the overall amount. “Specific data about the total and the deforested areas
are still matters of judicial secrecy,” Ibama told the Guardian.
Other powerful landholders are likely to
have been involved. In one wiretapped conversation, Castanha says he made clear
to his clients when the land he offered them was in protected areas:
“Even with these land grabbings, I never
sold land that was in the reserves without telling people … I always told the
truth,” he said. This suggests those who now own the illegal cleared land knew
they were benefitting from a dubious transaction.
The prosecutor, Azeredo said a new
investigation would be opened to address this issue. He also acknowledged that
the case highlighted the weaknesses of Brazil’s land registration system,
which has encouraged illegal land seizures.
Greenpeace said structural changes were
needed to back up the success of investigators.
“We are still very far away from zero
deforestation, which is our goal,” said Romulo Batista of Greenpeace. “One of
the steps towards this is land regularisation. Because nobody knows exactly who
owns what, it is currently too easy to sell deforested land.”
Castanha’s case gives hope, however, that
it will not be as easy in the future.
Additional reporting by Shanna Hanbury
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