{"id":78,"date":"2025-03-16T19:03:42","date_gmt":"2025-03-16T23:03:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/georgetownresearch.com\/?page_id=78"},"modified":"2025-04-08T19:41:16","modified_gmt":"2025-04-08T23:41:16","slug":"public-reports-2025","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/georgetownresearch.com\/index.php\/public-reports-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Public reports 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ratas de Lima: <\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n

A story of corruption, power, and a city’s fight back<\/em><\/strong><\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

Download PDF: Ratas de Lima<\/em> report<\/a><\/p>\n

Download PDF en Espa\u00f1ol:<\/em> Ratas de Lima report en espa\u00f1ol<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Download PDF: Ratas de Lima, Exhibit 1<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Download PDF: Ratas de Lima, Exhibit 2<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Download PDF: Ratas de Lima, Exhibit 3<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Summary.<\/strong> Canada\u2019s new Prime Minister, Mark Carney, is behind a corruption-plagued South American toll road scheme, swamped in litigation over bribes paid to the mayor who issued the contract.<\/p>\n

The Rutas de Lima toll road project, meant to ease the paralyzing traffic in the Peruvian capital, collapsed into scandal with revelations that the Brazilian firm Odebrecht had bribed the mayor with $3 million in 2013 for a 30-year contract to run the highway system.<\/p>\n

Instead of relief, Rutas brought predatory toll hikes that crushed the working poor, while Odebrecht pocketed the money. Brazilian authorities, in their expansive Operation Car Wash investigation of international corruption networks, led to Odebrecht pleading guilty in 2016 to what the U.S. Department of Justice called \u201cthe largest foreign bribery case in history.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yet, the elaborate plea bargain arrangement with DOJ in New York oddly omitted any reference to Rutas de Lima. Just before the scandal broke wide open, Odebrecht offloaded most of its stake to Brookfield, a Toronto-based investment and asset management giant, for about $500 million.<\/p>\n

Brookfield knew South American public works business like few others. But it claimed its due diligence had found nothing wrong with its new Odebrecht asset.<\/p>\n

New leadership emerged in 2022. On one side stood Brookfield chairman Mark Carney, a powerful ESG or Environment, Social, and Governance advocate – and now Canada\u2019s prime minister – who sidestepped the mess while his company kept turning the screws on the city of Lima. On the other side emerged Lima\u2019<\/span>s freshly elected Mayor Rafael L\u00f3pez Aliaga, a populist fighting to dismantle the corrupt contract.<\/p>\n

Brookfield defended its soiled Rutas asset through costly United Nations arbitration, profiting from Rutas escaping itemization in the 2016 plea bargain. The tolls remain, doubts swirl about the DOJ prosecutors\u2019 impartiality during the plea bargain \u2013 particularly Andrew Weissman, the ex-DOJ Fraud Section chief \u2013 that let Odebrecht pay at the lowest end of the sentencing guideline range and kept Rutas\u2019 name out of the arrangement.<\/p>\n

Brookfield then went on the offensive against Lima, portraying itself as the victim and suing the city for $2.7 billion in lost revenue. \u201cRutas\u201d or \u201cRoutes\u201d had become toxic in the eyes of many locals who now call the highway project \u201cRatas de Lima,\u201d or Rats of Lima.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Link to Rutas de Lima report URL<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ratas de Lima: A story of corruption, power, and a city’s fight back   Download PDF: Ratas de Lima report Download PDF en Espa\u00f1ol: Ratas de Lima report en espa\u00f1ol Download PDF: Ratas de Lima, Exhibit 1 Download PDF: Ratas de Lima, Exhibit 2 Download PDF: Ratas de Lima, Exhibit 3   Summary. Canada\u2019s new […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":1,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-78","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/georgetownresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/78","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/georgetownresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/georgetownresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/georgetownresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/georgetownresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78"}],"version-history":[{"count":38,"href":"https:\/\/georgetownresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/78\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":158,"href":"https:\/\/georgetownresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/78\/revisions\/158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/georgetownresearch.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}