Carlos Eduardo da Silva served for more than 23 years in the São Paulo Civil Police's elite organized-crime and narcotics divisions (DEIC and DENARC), investigating the PCC firsthand. He now writes on organized crime and its growing expansion into the global economy.
The US has branded Brazil's largest criminal organizations as terrorist groups. A former investigator cautions against drawing a straight line from them to Mexico's cartels or Italy's mafia — the comparison, he says, is far from perfect.
