Late yesterday morning, the Economic and Financial Police Unit of the Guardia di Finanza of Caserta – following a tailing – carried out a check on a suspicious van in the town of Giuliano in Campania (NA), seizing a total of 8 quintals of contraband cigarettes and identifying a house used as a local warehouse for local sales. A patrol of the Mobile Section of the PEF Unit of Caserta – as part of an economic control service of the territory – intercepted along the SS. 7-bis Aversa-Melito a van with Italian license plates in very poor condition and clearly weighed down by the load it was carrying. The finance police then decided to follow the vehicle to the courtyard of a building in the centre of the municipality of Giugliano in Campania where, after a few minutes' stop, the driver, together with another individual who later turned out to be the owner of the property, began to unload large cardboard boxes from the vehicle to transfer them inside a house on the mezzanine floor.
Therefore, the operating military proceeded to inspect the vehicle and open the boxes, finding approximately 2 quintals of contraband cigarettes. Subsequently, the financial police carried out a search of the house, noting the presence, even under the bed, of other cardboard boxes also containing contraband cigarettes, for another 6 quintals: a real emporium of contraband "blondes" available to the "network" of retailers.
The counting operation then made it possible to ascertain that the tobacco – intended for the local market and without the State mark – bore thirteen different brands including “REGINA”, “RICHMOND”, “MERIT”, “RONE”, “MARK 1”, “CHESTERFIELD”, “MARBLE”, “WEST”, “MARLBORO”, “NERO” and “AMERICAN LEGEND” and that most of it was so-called “cheap white” cigarettes, i.e. original tobaccos bearing brands registered in the respective countries of production (Russia, United Arab Emirates, China and Ukraine), which cannot, however, be sold in Italy or within the European Union, as they do not comply with the minimum safety parameters required by Community legislation.
Following the operations, the contraband goods and the means of transport used by the smugglers, worth approximately 200.000 Euro, were seized, while the two people responsible for the illicit trafficking (PF born in 1968 and EU born in 1974, both Italians living in Giugliano) were arrested in flagrante delicto for aiding and abetting the aggravated smuggling of foreign manufactured tobacco.
EDITORIAL TEAM
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