Kathryn Bonella spent a long time in Florianopolis for her latest book, , and tells SBS Portuguese a gripping story of how upper middle class surfer boys from Joaquina Beach became drug lords in the Florianopolis-Amsterdam-Bali circuit.
"Adrenalin junkies. Even the guys from Rio, like Marco Archer, who was executed. He was a professional hang glider. These guys… they surf, they hang glide, they parasail, they paraglide. They love extreme sports. They are very charismatic. Most of those men are very good looking."
is a relatively small capital city in Brazil, a paradisiac island in the South Atlantic, with a bit less than half million inhabitants and considered by the UNDP, using the Human Development Index, the best capital city to live in the country. Why it became so important in the cocaine smuggling?
"They were cheaper horses. There is a lot of European descendants there, so they are blonder, blue eyes. They sort of melding with the crowd. When they land in Europe, they don’t look so out of place", said Kathryn Bonella.
The bestseller author was amazed when one of the "playboys" revealed his remorse and guilt on handing to the horse Rodrigo Gularte the four surfboards with cocaine that sealed his fate in Indonesia, sending him down to death row and execution.
"He said 'I feel like I have blood on my hands'. It was almost like a confession and he hadn’t really talked to anyone about it. He feels great guilt and he wanted to talk about it", said Bonella.
, one of dozen beaches in the island, became famous for its great surf waves. And now, for the cocaine, skank and ecstasy connection.
“This is where it all started. They were the guys, and one of them said to me: “We are tough at Joaquina, we surf big waves, we are used to it, we are tough”.
Kathryn Bonella is the bestseller author of the "Bali trilogy": Schapelle Corby’s autobiography “My Story” was the first, then Hotel K and Snowing in Bali. She believes in Schapelle Corby's innocence.
Joaquina Beach: “This is where it all started”, said cop Caieron Source: Wikimedia Commons
Asked about the death penalty as a deterrence for the horses, Kathryn Bonella remind us of Rodrigo Gularte's case:
"Marco Archer, who anyone from Brazil would know, the first Westerner executed, the first Brazilian ever executed, in Indonesia… He was sentenced to death by the court in Jakarta and eight days later - just eight days later - they decided to send the horse Rodrigo Gularte to Bali."
She also says that the horses and drug lords loathe the nine to five boring life, as a Brazilian jailed in Indonesia told her, looking at a high rise from the prison courtyard:
"He looked at it and he pointed at me and said "To me that’s prison'. You know, living in a little flat, to him. He was saying it from the jail courtyard, but he still knew that he would get out and he had all this years of fantastic highlife."
Fernando Caieron, based in Florianopolis with the Brazilian Federal Police, was the creator and boss of Operation Playboy.
Kathryn Bonella had countless hours interviewing him.
"He was absolutely dedicated to catch these playboys and he is a straight cop. The judiciary in Brazil, the legal system, from the cops to the lawyers, is endemic with corruption. He is a straight cop in a bent system, trying to do his best to clean it up, to make a mark, to improve things in Brazil."
Asked about the dozens of young Brazilians horses being detained in Australia's airports with cocaine, Kathryn Bonella said it was not surprising at all, with so many Brazilians coming to Australia now.
"Australia is regarded as the prime target for any drug trafficker, especially cocaine, because it is the highest price on the planet. It’s the best market. When you are nineteen years old you are kind of bullet proof, 'I won’t get busted'. They can live for a year on the money that they make, so they take the risk."
From SBS Portuguese Archives:
Caiu em 50% o número de brasileiros presos com cocaína na Austrália
