The Carabinieri of the NAS (National Anti-Mafia Unit) in Milan, in the provinces of Milan, Lodi, Caserta, and Naples, have executed the precautionary detention order issued by the preliminary investigations judge of the Milan Court against 14 individuals (eight orders for pre-trial detention, four for house arrest, and two for mandatory reporting to the judicial police). They are believed to be responsible for the crimes of criminal conspiracy to defraud the National Health Service and receiving stolen medicines subsequently sent abroad. The investigation, dubbed 'Sic iubeo' and involving military personnel from the respective provincial commands and the NAS (National Anti-Mafia Unit) with territorial jurisdiction, was launched by NAS military personnel in 2015 and led to the identification of a well-established criminal organization dedicated to the illicit roundup of medicines from pharmacies throughout Lombardy. This organization used "red prescriptions" stolen from hospitals and family doctors, which were then filled out with false information in the names of unsuspecting or non-existent patients, completely exempt from co-payments. This enabled them to fraudulently procure large quantities of medicines. The medicines thus obtained were then transported abroad through accomplices in the Campania distribution sector, who physically handled the shipments, primarily to non-European countries, using illegal distribution channels and with complete disregard for proper product storage, posing a serious risk to public health.
The investigation activity, coordinated by the Public Prosecutor's Office of Milan, allowed the arrest in flagrante delicto of 5 individuals caught, during the investigations, in possession of prescribed drugs; the reporting at liberty of 48 supporters and colluders, in various capacities, with the main organization; the tracking of thousands of medical prescriptions, already accounted for in the flows of the Lombardy Region for reimbursement, with the ascertainment of a financial damage to the National Health Service quantified at over 500 thousand euros, for the year 2016 alone; the identification of an illicit channel for the reinvestment of the huge profits obtained by the criminal organization in the context of a parallel activity of procuring and spending counterfeit banknotes, subject to seizure during the investigative activities.
EDITORIAL TEAM
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