RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) – Brazilian authorities arrested a former finance minister Monday for his alleged role in a massive kickback scheme, the latest high-level politician to be snared in a corruption probe roiling Latin America’s largest nation.
Antonio Palocci, who was both a finance minister and chief of staff in the 2003-2010 government of former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, was detained in Sao Paulo in the morning. Palocci’s lawyer said his client was innocent and called the arrest a “spectacle.”
Investigators said Palocci exerted great influence with officials at Brazilian constructor Odebrecht, a principal participant in a kickback scheme at state oil company Petrobras that authorities say resulted in more than $2 billion in bribes over more than a decade.
Palocci allegedly negotiated deals on behalf of Silva’s Workers’ Party and received bribes himself, according to police. Seized documents showed 128 million Brazilian reals ($40 million) were paid to people connected to the Workers’ Party, including Palocci, between 2008 and 2013, authorities said.
“The flow of money was constant,” prosecutor Laura Goncalves Tessler said at a news conference in the southern city of Curitiba.