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Brazil has brought drug trafficking charges against Alexandre Rodrigues Gomes, the son of a former congressman with Paraguay’s ruling party who was killed in a police raid in 2024.
The Brazilian prosecutors office, known as the Federal Public Ministry (MPF), has charged Gomes with transnational drug trafficking aggravated by the use of a firearm, according to a February 9 indictment obtained by OCCRP.
Gomes also faces charges of money laundering linked to drug trafficking in Paraguay, where his case has been the subject of considerable media attention, and he has been in custody since 2024. The charges have not yet been tried in court.
He was charged alongside his father, Eulalio “Lalo” Gomes, who was a congressman and deputy in Paraguay's ruling Colorado Party before he was shot and killed in a shootout during an August 2024 police raid on a family home. The younger Gomes had initially escaped during the operation, but turned himself in later.
Gomes’ lawyer, Noelia Núñez, told OCCRP that neither Paraguayan nor Brazilian authorities have gathered sufficient evidence to show he was involved in any crimes.
The Brazilian embassy in Paraguay’s capital, Asuncion, has requested Gomes’ extradition and asked that he be kept in “preventative detention” in the meantime. The MPF alleges that he coordinated regular cocaine flights to Brazil, according to files from the investigation obtained by OCCRP.
The MPF alleges in its indictment that Gomes, “in addition to leading his own criminal organization, was responsible for transporting drugs from production sites in Andean countries to their destination in Paraguay or Brazil.”
Prosecutors claim he “coordinated the aircraft fleet and recruited narco-pilots.”
Gomes allegedly oversaw two clandestine airstrips — one in Paraguay and another in Brazil — according to prosecution files. Cocaine was flown from Bolivia and Colombia to Paraguay, put on another plane, and from there flown to Brazil. The drugs were then shipped out of Brazilian ports to Europe.
The MPF investigation is code named “Balkans,” and investigators claim that a man working with Gomes was in contact with members of a Balkan organized crime group, which managed drug shipments from Brazilian ports to Europe.
The Balkans investigation follows up on a 2021 MPF investigation named “Hinterland,”uncovered an alleged international drug trafficking scheme involving Paraguay and Brazil. Investigators said they found at least 11 tonnes of cocaine moved from South America to Europe between 2020 and 2021.
In Hinterland, Brazilian investigators say they were able to unravel the drug trafficking scheme by seizing “shielded” phones and devices using encrypted applications such as Sky ECC. Gomes was not charged in the Hinterland investigation. However, investigators working on the Balkan case later discovered his name among the Sky ECC chats.
Núñez, Gomes’ lawyer, told OCCRP the Sky chats alone do not constitute enough evidence to prove her client was guilty.
“Basically, there are no witnesses, nor documentary proof, nor suitable means to link Alexandre to the case, beyond the messages contained in the Sky system,” Núñez said.
According to Brazilian prosecutors, Gomes used a shell company called FRG Constructora S.A. to launder drug money into luxury real estate projects like the Tetryz Palace in Pedro Juan Caballero, a Paraguayan city on the border with Brazil.
Núñez said her client had testified in a previous hearing in Paraguay that the purchases were legitimate.
“I understand that all the properties he had were justified,” she said.
