The judicial dribble of André do Rap, the PCC's nexus with the Italian mafia on the cocaine route

André Macedo, a PCC drug trafficker, on the day of his arrest in a photo released by the Brazilian police.

With a luxurious life, with a business profile, entrepreneurial and non-violent.

This is André do Rap, a 43-year-old Brazilian trafficker who has been on the run since Saturday.

He was able to flee thanks to a

from the Supreme Court that was revoked hours later, when it was too late.

Police authorities believe that André de Oliveira Macedo - his real name - controls cocaine trafficking between Latin America and Europe.

They also suspect that as soon as he was released, he fled to Paraguay or Bolivia.

The last time he was on the run, Do Rap lived in Holland and was missing for six years.

According to the police, Do Rap, now on the list of the most wanted in São Paulo and Interpol's, commands the export of cocaine from Latin America (produced mainly in Peru, Bolivia and Colombia) to European ports through from the port of Santos, on the coast of that Brazilian State.

"He is responsible for the logistics of sending cocaine from the criminal faction PCC [First Command of the Capital] to Europe," says Commissioner Elvis Secco, coordinator of Repression on Drugs, Weapons and Criminal Factions of the Federal Police.

"He is also in charge of making the PCC's contacts with other international organizations," he says.

Police consider André do Rap as the main link between the PCC and the Italian mafia 'Ndrangheta, currently the world's leading criminal organization, which controls the distribution of drugs in Europe.

The PCC, in turn, dominates most of the drug trafficking in Brazil and even part of the production of marijuana and cocaine in neighboring countries, mainly Bolivia and Paraguay.

Marijuana is distributed in Brazil.

Part of the cocaine stays in the Brazilian domestic market and part goes to the international market, mainly European.

It is believed that he assumed that central role in the organization after the death of his colleague Gegê do Mangue, assassinated in 2018 in the middle of an internal dispute of the PCC.

André had been growing within the organization, he caught the attention of the main leaders –now prisoners– and naturally assumed the position.

For Commissioner Secco, being loose is a blow to the fight against international drug trafficking and it will be difficult to recapture him, since he has a lot of money and contacts.

From inside prison, his difficulties in coordinating the gang's business were greater.

Visits were suspended due to the pandemic and André's contacts with the streets were limited to his lawyers and correspondence.

"He is not going to stay waiting [to go to prison again] at home, you can be sure," he warned in statements to the Brazilian press, immediately after the release of the trafficker, prosecutor Lincoln Gakiya.

There were no shots or violence for the drug leader to get off the radar of justice.

As an irony of today's Brazil, it dodged the attacks of the Judicial Power, which is divided in relation to the

granted by Minister Marco Aurélio de Mello.

The injunction was revoked the same day by the president of the Court, Luis Fux.

The case will be analyzed this Wednesday by the plenary session of the Supreme Court.

André do Rap was a fugitive for six years until he was captured in September 2019. On that occasion, he was in a mansion in Angra dos Reis with imported cars, a luxury motorboat, two helicopters and cash.

His seized estate was valued at 28 million reais (five million dollars), most of it in the name of figureheads or registered under false identities.

At the time of imprisonment, he was accompanied by various people and did not react or try to flee.

No weapons or drugs were found at the scene.

From singer to narco leader

Born in Baixada Santista, André do Rap was a music producer and he recorded some songs simultaneously with his criminal activity before going to jail.

Some of his topics can be found on YouTube.

Like other rap singers, his rhymes tell about the life of a criminal in Baixada Santista, the prisons and the traffic-dominated slums in the region.

According to the police, André produced some artists from the São Paulo coastline and, shortly before going to jail, he was preparing to invest in soccer, buying and selling players.

Sentenced to 25 years in prison in the second instance in two cases of international drug trafficking, in 2013 and 2014, he came to live in the Netherlands for a few years when he was a fugitive with a false identity.

In that period, it would have helped deepen the contact between the PCC and the 'Ndrangheta.

Upon returning to Brazil, he received his associates from the Italian mafia several times, which according to the police would reveal his degree of proximity to them, something hitherto unprecedented in the history of the faction.

Upon being tried by the Brazilian Justice, André do Rap was even defended by lawyers from the Italian mafia organization, according to the investigations of the Deic (Department of Criminal Investigations of the State of São Paulo).

"From what I spoke with the police who are dealing with the case, this trafficker has a different profile, he is more sophisticated," says the retired TJ-SP (São Paulo Court of Justice) jurist and judge Wálter Maierovitch, a student of relations between Brazilian organized crime and Italian mafias. "This reveals a very great degree of proximity with Europeans, perhaps in a way that has never been seen before in the history of the PCC until now." With his release and subsequent escape, and the imprisonment and recent death of other leaders, the police today point to André do Rap as the main leader of the PCC released.