We address the issue of lepton flavor violation and neutrino masses in the
"fat-brane" paradigm, where flavor changing processes are suppressed by loc
alizing different fermion field wave functions at different positions (in t
he extra dimensions) in a thick brane. We study the consequences of suppres
sing lepton number violating charged lepton decays within this scenario for
lepton masses and mixing angles. In particular, we find that charged lepto
n mass matrices are constrained to be quasidiagonal. We further consider wh
ether the same paradigm can be used to naturally explain small Dirac neutri
no masses by considering the existence of three right-handed neutrinos in t
he brane, and discuss the requirements to obtain phenomenologically viable
neutrino masses and mixing angles. Finally, we examine models where neutrin
os obtain a small Majorana mass by breaking lepton number in a far away bra
ne and show that, if the fat-brane paradigm is the solution to the absence
of lepton number violating charged lepton decays, such models predict, in t
he absence of flavor symmetries, that charged lepton flavor violation will
be observed in the next round of rare muon or tau decay experiments.