Operation Car Wash leaves trail of disarray around Latin America

Operation Car Wash was the biggest anti-corruption effort in Brazil’s history. Across over six years of activities, the probe sentenced 165 people for crimes of corruption, investigated some 500 others, and recovered BRL 4 billion (USD 740 million) to the public treasury.

The sheer size and scope of Operation Car Wash saw its investigations spill over Brazil’s borders and into its Latin American neighbors. As the probe grew and spread, it led to the arrest of six former presidents in Peru, Panama, and El Salvador, as well as Brazil’s Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Michel Temer. Prosecution services from at least 18 countries signed agreements to exchange information and intelligence as part of Operation Car Wash.

Much of the investigations focused on the relationship between political campaigns and construction companies, particularly Brazilian firm Odebrecht. In 2017, the company admitted to the U.S. Department of Justice that it had paid around USD 788 million in bribes to government officials of 11 different countries in the Americas, between 2001 and 2016.

Most of the payments were related to bidding processes for subway lines and infrastructure projects. In exchange for government contracts, Odebrecht made payments to campaign funds and handed out secret cash payments to authorities.

The novelty of Operation Car Wash was not the corruption and bid rigging in itself, which is treated by many as a reprehensible yet commonplace facet of life in Latin America. The investigation digressed from previous probes...