Former Petrobras exec handed 4 year jail term and multimillion dollar fine

Rio de Janeiro, Jan 13 (EFE).- Jorge Zelada, former director of the international division of Petrobras, was sentenced Tuesday to four years of imprisonment and a $16.5 million fine for his involvement in a multimillion-dollar embezzlement scandal in the Brazilian state-run oil company, officials said.

Judge Flavio Itabaiana said there was ample evidence to prove Zelada committed fraud on an $825 million-contract, awarded in September 2010 to engineering giant Odebrecht, whose former president is also behind the bars.

Zelada, who has been in prison in the city of Curitiba since his arrest on July 2, 2015, was in charge of the company's international division between 2008 and 2012, after he replaced Nestor Cervero, who is also in prison indicted in the same case.

The corruption scandal till now has led to the arrest of dozens of businessmen, politicians and former heads of the oil company, including Joao Vaccari, former treasurer of Brazil's ruling Workers Party.

Investigators say a cartel of Petrobras subcontractors overcharged the oil giant for contracts, splitting the extra money with corrupt Petrobras executives and politicians who often received the money as campaign donations and duly reported to Brazil's electoral and tax authorities.

The company says it has written off nearly $2 billion in corruption-related losses from the period between 2004 and 2014.