Paraguayan courts ordered the definitive confiscation of assets linked to Brazilian businessman Darío Messer, his son Dan Wolf Messer and companies associated with a money-laundering investigation. The decision was signed by Criminal Enforcement Judge Carlos Luis Mendoza Peña in Interlocutory Order No. 198, dated August 26, 2026, in compliance with Final Judgment No. 3 of January 3, 2024.
The measure was taken after the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice declared the final appeals filed by the defense inadmissible. With no further avenues of appeal in the criminal sphere, the assets formally pass to the state and will be managed by the National Secretariat for the Administration of Seized and Confiscated Assets (Senabico), the agency responsible for managing seized and confiscated assets.
The inventory includes all of Chai S.A., Matrix Realty S.A. and Pegasus Inversiones S.A., as well as about 109 properties. Of these, 31 are linked to Chai and 78 to Matrix Realty, distributed across municipalities including Mariscal José Félix Estigarribia, Bahía Negra, San Pedro, Paraguarí, Ybycuí, San Juan del Paraná, Hernandarias, Asunción, Ciudad del Este and Mariano Roque Alonso.
Also confiscated were 19,981 head of cattle, 339 horses, agricultural and road-building tractors and machinery, nine pickup trucks, a Scania truck with a trailer, two motorcycles, trailers and other assets. The list also includes a 2005 Raytheon Beechcraft Baron 58 aircraft, registration ZPBJI, as well as 10 bank accounts, investments and shares on the Asunción Stock and Products Exchange valued at 500 million guaraníes.
To preserve the assets during the transfer, the judge prohibited changes and new contracts, ordered the preventive blocking of properties, machinery and vehicles, and directed that the assets be registered in Senabico’s name. The Supreme Court’s Technical Office for the Coordination of the Registration of Seized and Confiscated Assets is to handle the procedures before public and vehicle registries.
Meanwhile, prosecutors are investigating seven offices in Paraqvaria Tower II in Hernandarias. In 2014, Paraqvaria S.A. received four contributions from Matrix Realty—US$600,000, US$604,000, US$40,000 and US$30,000—for a real estate project that did not move forward. A contract dated February 28, 2015, recorded that the same contributions corresponded to the purchase of the offices and their parking spaces.
On July 19, 2021, Paraqvaria transferred the seven properties to Banco Atlas through a guarantee trust estimated at approximately US$1.55 million. The bank says public records showed the properties in Paraqvaria’s name and free of liens, without disclosing the private contract with the company linked to Messer. Prosecutors have not accused Atlas of deliberate concealment, but the bank must submit documents concerning its due-diligence controls.
Rafael Casabianca, Paraqvaria’s representative, told prosecutors that he signed the contract under intense pressure and later stated in disclosed conversations that prosecutors and Senabico already knew about the agreement. The prosecution maintains a different interpretation and says the document was withheld. The inquiry is expected to clarify how rights to the offices entered the trust while Messer’s assets were under judicial control.