From the sparkling, emerald-green
waters of the Atlantic off the east coast of Brazil, Cavala
Island looks like a tropical paradise of lush vegetation framed
by giant rocks. It’s also where millionaire Antonio Claudio Resende, a founder of
Latin America’s largest car-rental
company, became a squatter.
There, starting in 2006, he cleared pristine jungle where
wild bromeliad flowers grow to make way for a 1,752-square-meter
mansion, according to the Rio de Janeiro state environmental
agency. The house -- which is built partially underground and
hidden by surrounding lush forest -- is visible only from above
by aircraft.
Resende, 65, broke the rules that gave him the right to
occupy the land on a nature preserve, not to build a large home,
Brazilian federal judges found. He has been fighting civil and
criminal charges against him for more than four years, filing
appeals while defying court orders to demolish the house and
leave, Bloomberg Markets magazine reports in its April issue.
Resende is among scores of millionaires who spend weekends
and vacation time in homes built in violation of state and
federal environmental rules on some of the most beautiful real
estate in
Brazil, Rio’s state environmental institute, INEA,
found in an August 2011 report.
The squatters include movie director Bruno Barreto, who
destroyed preserved land on Pico Island in Paraty Bay,
prosecutors say.
Beachfront Compounds
Others, such as the family that controls multinational
construction giant Camargo Correa SA, received government
permission to build small houses in a nature preserve -- and
instead constructed beachfront compounds.
Heirs to Roberto Marinho, who created Organizacoes Globo,
South America’s biggest media group, built a 1,300-square-meter
(14,000-square-foot) home, helipad and swimming pool in part of
the Atlantic coastal forest that by law is supposed to be
untouched because of its ecology.
Hollywood producers chose a Polynesian-style mansion on the
Mamangua Inlet as the romantic setting for a sex scene in “The
Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1,” the fourth
movie in the
teen vampire series. The house was built by millionaire squatter
Icaro Fernandes, an executive in the food distribution industry.
All Brazilian beaches are public by law. Wealthy Brazilians
do whatever they want on land that often doesn’t belong to them,
says Eduardo Godoy of the Paraty office of the Chico Mendes
Institute for Biodiversity Conservation, or
ICMBio, which
manages federally protected areas.
‘Not What the Law Says’
“They think they are the only ones who deserve to enjoy a
piece of paradise because they are rich,” Godoy says. “They
say they are the owners of the island or the beach, and
everybody believes them. But that’s not what the law says.”
Fernandes declined to comment. Rogerio Zouein, his lawyer,
admitted that Fernandes had built a house without a license.
Zouein told prosecutors in April 2011 that Fernandes would
restore 95 percent of his property to its original condition if
he could stay in the home. Prosecutors were evaluating the
request as of early March.
That court response is a common way that many of the
wealthy squatters use to handle judges’ orders. They typically
don’t deny they’ve harmed the environment and instead pledge to
undo the damage. After that, they take no action.
Broken Promise
Film director Barreto promised in court in January 2008
that he would demolish his house and put the area back to its
original state within two years. Four years later, Barreto
remains on the property, having left it intact, prosecutors say.
Barreto, who is appealing government complaints again him,
declined to comment.
As the wealthy in Brazil get richer from the fastest
economic growth there in more than two decades, the unlawful use
of public land is increasing in nature preserves, says Godoy,
whose federal environmental agency in Paraty, a 17th-century
colonial town about 250 kilometers (155 miles) south of
Rio de
Janeiro, faces a bay filled with illegally occupied islands.
Squatters have chosen to reside in the Cairucu, Juatinga
and Tamoios conservation areas, in forests and on islands, with
rivers, waterfalls and beaches where sea turtles nest. The rich
use attorneys to dodge laws, lie to authorities on construction
permit requests, illegally destroy preserved land and rivers and
privatize beaches by hiring armed security guards to keep out
visitors, Godoy says.
Law enforcers and judges pushing to remove squatters from
nature preserves have little clout, says Fernando Amorim
Lavieri, a federal prosecutor who spent three years in the
Paraty area. Rich Brazilians can get away with almost anything,
Lavieri says.
‘Drag On’
“The law is the same for the poor and the rich, but the
rich have the best lawyers,” he says. “Lawsuits against them
drag on in court for years.”
Brazil’s economy, fueled by a
credit surge and booming
exports during the past decade, has boosted the value of assets,
including real estate,
stocks, bonds and commodities, thereby
creating 19 new millionaires every day in a country of 190
million people, according to the 2010 World Wealth Report by
Capgemini SA (CAP) and
Bank of America Merrill Lynch.
Brazilians have a collective net worth of $890 billion, or
39 percent of all individual assets in South America, according
to a November 2011 report by Wealth-X, a Singapore-based
research firm.
Squatters take advantage of loopholes in the laws, Lavieri
says. Starting in 1983, the federal government enacted laws to
preserve the regions of Paraty and nearby Angra dos Reis because
rare species at risk of extinction inhabit them. Local statutes
allow some people to live there because indigenous fishing
families have been in now-preserved areas for generations.
‘Follow the Rules’
Everyone who buys a right to a property in a conservation
area must follow strict limits on what they can build, if
they’re allowed to build at all.
“If they don’t follow the rules, the government can revoke
their right to occupy the land and order them to demolish
whatever they built,” says Jose Olimpio Augusto Morelli, an
environmental analyst who heads the office of
Ibama, Brazil’s
federal environmental agency, in Angra dos Reis.
Ibama ordered Resende to tear down the house he was
building on Cavala Island.
Forged Documents
Federal prosecutors charged Resende, vice chairman and the
largest shareholder of
Localiza Rent a Car SA, with fraud and
environmental crime in November 2007. Resende had filed forged
documents in seeking permits to build his mansion on Cavala
Island, according to the criminal charges.
In March 2008, federal police, Ibama and state government
agents raided Cavala from two speedboats and found the hidden
paradise. In that raid, Morelli says, he saw two huge machines
that Resende used to excavate more than 2,000 square meters of
earth to hide his mansion below the tree line.
“I saw a fireplace big enough to fit a car, and there were
huge piles of marble everywhere, waiting to be placed on the
floors and walls,” Morelli says.
Prosecutors sued Resende in a civil case in August 2008,
saying he had violated environmental rules.
Resende paid 4.8 million reais ($2.8 million) in November
2005 to AC Lobato Engenharia SA, an engineering company based in
Angra dos Reis that had previously owned the right to occupy the
land, according to a federal police investigation.
Resende has been appealing the civil and criminal
accusations. He said in a court-filed response that federal
judges shouldn’t rule on the case because the Tamoios
conservation area was created by a state decree. Sergio
Rosenthal, his lawyer, said in court that Resende doesn’t know
anything about fraud or forged documents.
Only Tropical Fjord
On the other side of
Paraty Bay, Icaro Fernandes, owner of
Rhino Participacoes & Distribuidora de Alimentos Ltda., a Sao
Paulo-based wholesale food distributor, bought a 400,000-square-
-meter piece of land in 2003 on Praia da Costa beach on the
Mamangua Inlet.
The property, in the 8,000-hectare (19,800-acre) Juatinga
ecological preserve, is protected because it’s home to the only
tropical fjord in
South America. The spot is flanked by
mountains covered with virtually untouched forest where monkeys,
anteaters and jaguars live.
Fernandes constructed a two-story, 666-square-meter home on
the beach, prosecutors say in a civil court case against him.
The 15-room house has wooden shutters and glass-panel windows on
the ground floor. A guesthouse and a housekeeper’s chalet sit up
a hill.
Fernandes Sued
Federal prosecutors sued Fernandes in November 2004 for not
obtaining an environmental license to build. He had cut down
parts of the protected forest, filled in a stream and removed
coastal vegetation, federal prosecutor Patricia Venancio wrote
in a Jan. 3, 2006, report.
A court ordered Fernandes in 2004 to stop construction, and
he didn’t. Since then, he’s been appealing judicial demands to
tear down the house he completed and restore the land to its
original state, according to a September 2011 report by ICMBio.
Paul Pflug, a spokesman for
Summit Entertainment Corp., (SUET)
says the company isn’t aware of prosecutor accusations regarding
the property where it filmed Breaking Dawn.
Most millionaires register properties in the names of
holding companies, allowing them to pay lower taxes and making
it more difficult for the government to know who’s responsible
for environmental crimes, says Ricardo Martins, a federal
prosecutor. Often, the companies are controlled by other
companies based in
tax havens.
Modernist Home
That’s the case with the Marinho media family. The Marinhos
broke environmental laws by building a 1,300-square-meter
mansion just off Santa Rita beach, near Paraty, says Graziela
Moraes Barros, an inspector at ICMBio.
Without permits, the family in 2008 built a modernist home
between two wide, independent concrete blocks sheathed in glass,
Barros says. The Marinho home has won several architectural
honors, including the 2010
Wallpaper Design Award.
The Marinhos added a swimming pool on the public beach and
cleared protected jungle to make room for a helipad, says
Barros, who participated in a raid of the property as part of
the federal prosecutors office’s lawsuit against construction on
the land.
“This one house provides examples of some of the most
serious environmental crimes we see in the region,” Barros
says. “A lot of people say the Marinhos rule Brazil. The beach
house shows the family certainly thinks they are above the
law.”
Armed Guards
Two security guards armed with pistols patrol the land,
shooing away anyone who tries to use the public beach, she says.
A federal judge in November 2010 ordered the family to tear down
the house and all other buildings in the area. The Marinhos were
appealing that ruling as of early March.
Their lawyer, Corina Tarcila de Oliveira Resende, who’s not
related to Antonio Claudio Resende, declined to comment.
Barreto built his dream house on an island 15 kilometers
from the Marinho compound. The film director has no right to use
the land, police say. Prosecutors charged Barreto in February
2006 with illegally clearing protected forest in an area that
belongs to Brazil’s navy.
A September 2008 inspection by ICMBio found that Barreto
had built a 450-square-meter mansion on top of rocks that
surround the island -- a crime because the area is protected as
a breeding ground for several species, ICMBio’s Godoy says.
Barreto, who was married to actress Amy Irving and who
directed “View From the Top” starring
Gwyneth Paltrow and
“Carried Away” with
Dennis Hopper, hasn’t made good on his
2008 court promise to demolish the house. He and his lawyers,
Arthur Lavigne and Fernanda Silva Telles, didn’t reply to
requests for comment.
Billionaire Compound
The owners of
Camargo Correa (CCIM3), Brazil’s largest construction
conglomerate, also built on preserved land, Barros says.
Agropecuaria & Comercial Conquista Ltda. and Regimar Comercial
SA own the land. Fernando de Arruda Botelho is the owner of
Agropecuaria.
He’s married to billionaire Rosana Camargo de Arruda
Botelho. Regina de Camargo Pires Oliveira Dias, Rosana’s sister,
owns Regimar. The family built a luxury compound in the Cairucu
nature preserve, according to reports by Ibama. In October 2011,
the family illegally built two 700-square-meter houses, adding
to the already unauthorized construction, Barros says.
In June 2010, the beach was the venue for the wedding of
Fernando Augusto Camargo de Arruda Botelho, Fernando Botelho’s
son. About 800 guests attended.
Contradictory and Confusing
Fernando Botelho declined to comment. Regimar executive
director Jose Sampaio Correa says the company obtained the
required licenses for construction. He says environmental rules
in conservation areas are sometimes contradictory and confusing.
Brazil’s bureaucracy often makes it difficult to comply with the
laws, he says.
“These actions are proof that they completely disregard
the law, they take ownership of natural resources and believe
their rights are greater than the rights of everybody else,”
prosecutor Lavieri says.
As environmental investigator Morelli gets ready in his
office for another boat raid one sunny January morning, he
admires the beautiful islands and forests he sees from his
windows. He says he dreams of a day when rich Brazilians will
set the example of how to do things right. Until then, he says,
money will continue to be more powerful than the law.
Editors: Jonathan Neumann, Gail Roche
To contact the reporter on this story:
Adriana Brasileiro in Rio de Janeiro at
abrasileiro@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Jonathan Neumann at
jneumann2@bloomberg.net 
