- Marcelo Carrião was arrested by authorities in Santos, Brazil, on Thursday
- The police identified the journalist as the main ‘supplier’ of drug traffickers
- Carrião last worked as a presenter for SBT in 2023; He was previously an employee of Rede Record
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A former Brazilian journalist was arrested as a major supplier to drug traffickers in Brazil, authorities announced.
Marcelo Carrião, 51, was arrested along with five other people on Thursday and accused of being the main “supplier” of a network that supplied drugs to traffickers in Santos, São Paulo.
The head of the Specialized Criminal Investigations Division of the São Paulo Civil Police, Fabiano Barbeiro, said five other suspects were detained as part of “Operation Iron Lady.”
Authorities were working to locate three other suspects.
“We are now investigating the sources from which Marcelo purchased these medications,” Barbeiro said.
Marcelo Carrião, former presenter of the Brazilian network SBT, was arrested along with five other drug traffickers who supplied drugs to street vendors in Santos, a city in the southern state of São Paulo.
Authorities raided several properties in Santos, Brazil, on Thursday and arrested six suspected drug traffickers, including former news anchor Marcelo Carrião. The drugs and mobile devices seen here were confiscated from his home.
Carrião’s lawyer, Marcelo Cruz, denied the accusations made by the police.
‘Marcelo is over 50 years old and to date has never had any type of investigation for crimes of this nature. He, in fact, consumes drugs, and the drugs seized today at his residence were intended for his own consumption,” Cruz told O Globo. ‘Marcelo has almost 30 years of journalism, is a transport company and has always had a job legal. He has been working since he was 14 years old.’
Carrião was scheduled to appear before a judge on Thursday.
Carrião, who is married with two children, worked as a reporter and host for SBT from 2012 until this year.
Previously, he was a reporter for Rede Record from 2005 to 2011 and worked as a producer and reporter at TV Mar between 1993 and 2005.
Carrião and his eight co-defendants were attacked by police following the arrest of two delivery women, aged 19 and 23, on February 6.
Leonardo Rivau, who heads the Narcotics Investigation Station, said investigators discovered a conversation on one of the cellphones confiscated from workers that implicated Carrião.
Former reporter and news anchor Marcelo Carrião was arrested on Thursday by the Civil Police in the state of São Paulo, in southeastern Brazil. Authorities identified the journalist as the main ‘supplier’ of marijuana traffickers
Carrião has worked for the Brazilian media SBT, Rede Record and TV Mar.
One of the women was in charge of managing the logistics of the drug trafficking business from a home in the Santos de Gonzaga neighborhood and was also the intermediary between the drug traffickers who sold the drugs.
“He (Carrião) offered the drugs, she placed the order and arranged delivery so she could buy it and resell it in Gonzaga (a neighborhood in Santos), said Rivau.
Police raided several residences, including a house where three tents were set up to grow marijuana plants.
‘In this (house), in particular, we found a plantation owned by two brothers who are drug suppliers for one of the targets (of the operation),’ Rivau said.