A man who was on the run from Justice and is suspected of being part of a criminal organization specializing in electronic scams and money laundering, carried out in Oeste Paulista, was arrested on Thursday (12), in Banzaê, in the interior of Bahia.
The group investigated by the São Paulo Civil Police moved around R$480 million in a few months through companies used to hide the origin of illegally obtained resources.
The arrest occurred during an intelligence action by the Civil Police of Presidente Prudente (SP), with support from the security forces of Bahia.
The suspect had been wanted since the launch of Operation Cineris, in August 2025, which investigated the criminal scheme based on a scam carried out against a resident of Rosana (SP), in the West of São Paulo.
According to the Civil Police, the man was located in a small residence in the municipality of Bahia. After confirming his presence at the property, police officers served the preventive arrest warrant issued by the São Paulo Court. He was one of those investigated who had not yet been located.
The investigation was conducted by the 1st Police District of Rosana, in the district of Primavera, with support from the Presidente Prudente Police Intelligence Unit (UIP-8).
How the scheme worked
The investigations began in 2022, after a resident of Rosana lost more than R$30,000 after being convinced to make supposed financial contributions on a product sales website. The promise was that he would receive commissions for operations.
With the breach of the confidentiality of banking, telephone and internet data, authorized by the Court, the police identified that the victims' money fell into digital accounts opened in the name of third parties and was transferred, almost immediately, to shell companies.
These companies concealed the origin of the values before returning them to the group's leaders. The banking analysis identified victims in at least ten states.
In less than seven days, only eight of these accounts received more than R$1.5 million. A single company used in the scheme moved around R$480 million in a few months, in almost 5 thousand transactions.
Account holders were lured into communities in the capital of São Paulo, including in a region hit by floods, with the promise of basic food baskets, jobs or payments of between R$50 and R$150.
They were then taken to the upper floor of a bar in Brás, where their faces and documents were photographed. With these images, the group opened accounts and maintained control of banking applications.
The Civil Police concluded that these people were also deceived and did not act consciously, and represented the Public Prosecutor's Office to have them recognized as victims, and not as perpetrators.
The first phase of the operation
The overt phase of Operation Cineris was launched on August 27, 2025, with the execution of 22 search and seizure warrants and seven preventive arrest warrants: six issued in the process and one, which was already open, from the Minas Gerais Court. Four members of the group's central nucleus were arrested that day.
During the searches, the police seized cell phones, bank cards, documents and money, deposited in a judicial account.
In a warehouse rented by an investigated couple, 28 cell phones were found, and in the couple's residence, the deed for a high-end apartment in Mooca, purchased in June 2025.
At another prisoner's house, in Jardim Saúde, south of the capital, the police discovered a secret door that gave access to an underground bunker in the final stages of construction.
Investigations continue
With the evidence gathered in the operation, the Civil Police presented a complementary report to the Court and indicted six more people being investigated for criminal organization, electronic fraud and money laundering.
Among them are the owner of the bar where the victims were photographed, who, according to the investigation, directly participated in collecting the images, and the person responsible for an investment application company that made payments used as bait in the scams.
According to the police, a man who lent his name to open companies used in laundering is also being investigated, as are the three partners of a payment institution that only operated in a coworking space.
The aforementioned trio received most of the amounts that passed through accounts opened in the name of the people enticed, according to authorities.
The Court granted all the measures requested by the Civil Police, including:
preventive detention of the six new indictees;
kidnapping of amounts of up to R$5 million in accounts of each of the two companies linked to the payment institution;
suspension of the activities of these two companies;
hijacking and blocking of seven vehicles;
unavailability of two properties: the apartment in Mooca and the house where the bunker was found;
access to data stored in the cloud of one of the prisoners, whose cell phone was formatted moments before arrest.
This Thursday's action (12) had the support of the Civil Police of the State of Bahia and the Military Police. The others under investigation with an open arrest warrant were at large until the last update. The case remains under investigation.
The Civil Police reinforces that information that helps to find the wanted persons can be passed on, anonymously, via Hotline (181).
