BRASILIA--Three senior Brazilian law enforcement officials, including the former prosecutor general, said new leaders of the federal police and prosecutors' offices are curbing an anti-corruption drive that challenged centuries of impunity in Latin America's biggest country.
Rodrigo Janot, who until mid-September was Brazil's prosecutor general and remains an influential senior prosecutor, told Reuters this week he believes that President Michel Temer, whom he charged on three different counts of corruption, appointed a new head of federal police specifically to "divert" graft investigations.
Separately, two other senior law enforcement officials said that Raquel Dodge, Janot's replacement as prosecutor general, told some senior prosecutors in the capital Brasilia to shift away from corruption probes and stop talking publicly about anti-graft efforts.
In a statement, the president's office said the police chief was appointed after consultations with the police force. It criticized any suggestions the new director would hinder investigations. "Only someone ill-informed or ill-intentioned could suppose that interference in investigations is possible," Temer's office said.
A spokeswoman for Dodge said the new prosecutor general was vigorously combating corruption on numerous fronts. Fernando Segovia, the new police director, in an email to Reuters said his office will strengthen the fight against corruption.
Brazil's crackdown on graft in recent years led to dozens of convictions of senior politicians, government officials and corporate executives, inspiring many Brazilians to believe that a longstanding culture of impunity was changing. It also helped spawn similar crackdowns elsewhere in Latin America.
But in Brazil, where Congress recently shielded Temer from charges, some investigators and prosecutors say that elected officials are finding ways to outmaneuver them, especially as they seek, before elections next year, to retain seats that give them constitutional safeguards against prosecution. The sprawling nature of many of Brazil's inquiries, conducted by investigators in dozens of far-flung offices, would make any concerted effort to derail them difficult, corruption experts said.
But Janot's dissent, and growing criticism expressed by other senior officials, reveal a growing rift at the top levels of Brazilian law enforcement at a time when some investigators believe Temer and Congressional allies are out to quash landmark investigations. "Now is the time to speak up," Janot told Reuters, "so that all this effort will not have been in vain."
