Criminal gang suspected of involvement in sugar cane fires in Brazil, official says

Several suspects arrested for setting fire to sugar cane plantations in Sao Paulo state told police they had links to an organized criminal gang and were taking revenge for government anti-crime measures, a senior state official said Tuesday.

The fires that broke out last week spread rapidly through the parched fields over the weekend, at the height of the dry season, destroying thousands of hectares of sugar cane plantations and sending plumes of smoke into nearby towns.

Agriculture Secretary Guilherme Piai told Reuters that fires broke out in several locations at the same time, suggesting they were not accidental.

The government suspects that one of Brazil’s largest criminal gangs, Primeiro Comando da Capital (commonly known as PCC), is behind the fires. The fires are intended as retaliation for measures to combat the criminal trade in counterfeit fuels.

“We don’t really know what the motivation was, but some said they were linked to PCC. Others naively wanted to take revenge on the agribusiness industry, which is the driving force of the Brazilian economy,” Piai said.

Organized crime has bought up bankrupt fuel plants and hundreds of gas stations, he said, adding that the fires could be a way of retaliating for government measures to combat organized crime.

PCC was founded in 1993 by prisoners in a maximum security prison in Sao Paulo. The gang grew from drug trafficking to become the most powerful and feared criminal gang in Brazil.

Agriculture Minister Carlos Favaro previously called the fires in the sugar cane fields criminal, but he did not provide details.

More than 2,100 fires raged in sugarcane fields, resulting in the burning of 59,000 hectares (146,000 acres) of sugarcane fields and regrowth areas. São Paulo accounts for about half of Brazil’s sugarcane plantations.

According to the Organization of Sugar Cane Producers Associations in Orplana, the fires have caused losses estimated at $63.59 million (350 million real).

Governor Tarcisio de Freitas estimated the total damage to crops and other properties and activities at more than R$1 billion.

Since Thursday, four men have been arrested after being caught in possession of containers of gasoline to set fire to fields, Freitas said. On Tuesday, police reported the arrests of two more men who were caught on security cameras setting fire to vegetation.

According to Luis Fernando Rocha, the federal prosecutor investigating the fires, there is no evidence so far of coordinated arson.

“It was criminal. But so far we have no elements to say that this was organized crime,” he said.