The Committee on the Constitution and Justice and Citizenship (CCJ) approved on Tuesday (15th) the inclusion of offense against the tax legal system and fraud in insurance contracts as crimes that be considered as crime of money laundering.

Currently, the Law 9613/98 considers that the simple concealment of income acquired through crimes such as drug trafficking, terrorism and extortion through kidnapping is punished with imprisonment from three to ten years and fine.

Dummy corporation
Rules were also approved that extend the punishment for those who benefit from money laundering, by means of operations off-shores – companies that belong to Brazilian people and headquartered abroad – in tax haven, to the companies’ attorneys.

“The offshore companies enable dummy corporations dedicated to money laundering to spread, under the protection of permissive tax legal system in the taxes havens”, stated the rapporteur of the subject on the committee, deputy Regis de Oliveira (PSC-SP).

According to Oliveira, to fight against these frauds is necessary "to insert attorneys of the off-shore companies in the list of those who are active players in the money laundering crime mechanism”.

The idea to even the attorneys to theirs instigator on frauds to “clean” dirty money was approved on a substitute amendment of the Committee on Public Security and Fight against Organized Crime, and was used in the text passed on CCJ.

The approved text increases the minimum sentence for illegal exchange transactions from two to four years in confinement. The maximum sentence is still six years.

In process
The bills will be analyzed next by the Floor

Reporting - Edvaldo Fernandes
Edition - Newton Araújo