Luso-Brazilian suspected of leading the First Command of the Capital and drug trafficking in Portugal freed in Dubai
The Portuguese-Brazilian Leonardo Serro dos Santos, who had been detained in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, since the beginning of November, was released yesterday, his lawyer in Portugal, Klaus Luchtenberg, confirmed to VISÃO.
Appointed as the leader of the largest international drug trafficking network in Portugal, controlled by the Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC) – the largest and most dangerous criminal organization in Latin America – Leonardo Serro dos Santos had been detained for 45 days (period limit for preventive detention in that city) and was released after the Brazilian authorities did not send any formal request for extradition to the emirate during this period.
TO VISÃO, Klaus Luchtenberg, a Brazilian lawyer based in Portugal, considers that “Brazil was the most interested in the extradition [de Leonardo Serro dos Santos]” and that this resulted in “proof” that his client “is not the person he says he is” in the last few days. “Why didn’t Brazil make the extradition request within the deadline? If Leonardo [Serro dos Santos] were, in fact, the leader of a criminal organization like the PCC, in Portugal, that request would certainly arrive in good time. This allows my client to be cleared, without a doubt”, says the lawyer.
TO VISION, Klaus Luchtenberg he had already guaranteed that the statements about his client “are totally false”🇧🇷 “There are people investigated in the scope of this process [que decorre no Brasil] who are allegedly involved in drug trafficking. the leonardo [Serro dos Santos] he did have professional contacts with these people, but there is no evidence that he was actually involved in any criminal activity. He was unaware, moreover, that these people were addicted to drug trafficking,” said Klaus Luchtenberg. On the same occasion, Leonardo Serro dos Santos’ wife – in exclusive statements to VISÃO – had also insisted on the innocence of her Luso-Brazilian partner.
Remember that Leonardo Serro dos Santos was preventively detained by Interpol, in the first week of November, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (and not in Abu Dhabi, as had initially been advanced)city where he lived with his wife and son since last January.
With the nickname “Carioca”, Leonardo Serro dos Santos, 47 years old, was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, but has lived in Parede, in the municipality of Cascais, since 2018. From that year onwards, he began to regularly cross the Atlantic – the justification is the business they maintained in their home country.
Sole partner of a sports career management company, based in Cruz Quebrada-Dafundo, in the municipality of Oeiras – created in October 2019, but without any known activity over these three years – Leonardo Serro dos Santos had already been arrested in Brazil, in a short visit to his home country, accused of the same crime, within the scope of an operation by the Brazilian Federal Police in Rio de Janeiro, which arose following an alert by the North American DEA, a federal body dedicated to the fight against drug trafficking in the United States of America.
After almost four years in Portugal – and already in possession of Portuguese nationality –, Leonardo Serro dos Santos will decide to leave the country, in January 2022, settling in Dubai (but staying in Parede), where he started to dedicate himself to to the activity of real estate agent.
In early November, he would be arrested following an Interpol alert. Forty-five days later, he was released again. According to VISÃO, it is his intention to remain in that emirate with his family.