International Smuggling, 28 Arrests Across Europe

Heavy blow to international smuggling of cigarettes, liquor and energy products. 28 people arrested.

Since early today, over one hundred soldiers from the Trentino Yellow Flames, with the support of the territorial departments competent for the territory, have been carrying out arrests and searches throughout the national territory against a combative network, divided into five interconnected groups, composed mainly of individuals of Italian, Romanian, Moldovan, Ukrainian, Greek and Maltese nationality, dedicated to the international smuggling of cigarettes, energy products and alcoholic beverages with important ramifications in Slovenia, Germany, Belgium, England, Holland, Poland, France, Bulgaria and Greece, countries from and to which the contraband goods were imported/exported.

This is the operation called “MELITA”, which has just concluded with the execution of a precautionary custody measure in prison against 28 suspects, 20 of whom are wanted on the national territory (provinces of Bari, Rome, Trieste, Latina, Naples, Campobasso, Caserta, Perugia, Lecce, La Spezia, Massa Carrara, Isernia, Alessandria, Treviso and Venice) and the remaining 8 abroad (Croatia, Belgium, Moldova, England, Germany and Bulgaria), the latter being recipients of a specific European arrest warrant (EAW) and an international arrest warrant.

The arrests made in these hours - ordered against the individuals who, during the activities, would have been identified as the main responsible for the network dedicated to the purchase, storage and marketing of large quantities of contraband products - are added to the two arrests in flagrante delicto already made during the investigations.

The investigations were initiated on the initiative in 2018 following the monitoring of some articulated trucks in transit at the Brenner Pass and were conducted by the Economic and Financial Police Unit of Trento, with the support of the SCICO of Rome, under the direction of the District Attorney's Office of Trento.

Thanks to the help of sophisticated technical instruments useful for revealing double bottoms or cover loads, as well as by resorting to telephone, telematic and environmental interceptions, it was possible to reconstruct a flourishing illicit traffic of contraband products coming from numerous European countries (in particular Slovenia and Germany) transported on board articulated trucks, buses, vans and even single cars often equipped with hidden compartments or accompanied by loads of cover goods, which arrived in Italy also from the Prato La Drava, Tarvisio and Trieste border crossings as well as from the Brenner Pass.

Among the various systems used for smuggling, the following modus operandi are worth mentioning:
the shipment of TLE or energy products, by land or by sea, in trucks or containers, with the use of cover loads or vehicles equipped with artificially created double bottoms, accompanied by fictitious documentation prepared specifically for the purpose.

The instrumental use of the customs community transit regime, whereby cigarettes, officially sold by the manufacturer or by intermediaries, travel to Italy with apparently regular documentation, which certifies their destination to countries outside the EU and are subsequently illegally released for consumption on the national territory through the "false" verification of T1 documents (Community transit document for goods, destined for outside the EU, which travel under tax suspension) and the preparation of equally false export declarations.

The ad hoc opening of tax warehouses where to fictitiously store loads of alcoholic beverages, in suspension of tax, coming from EU suppliers and actually destined for the European black market.

Among other things, the involvement of a distillery based in Trentino also emerged, which attempted to smuggle a large quantity of alcoholic products in evasion of customs duties, through the fraudulent transfer of two loads of vodka (39.960 bottles), seized in Verona in March 2019.

During the investigations, the cooperation provided by the foreign police forces of the various countries involved, activated through the instrument of international judicial cooperation, as well as the coordination carried out by the DNAA following the numerous convergences with other District Attorneys' Offices (in particular the DDA of Bari, Naples and Trieste), proved invaluable.

Following the investigations, on the basis of the evidence currently collected, the position of 115 individuals (of Italian, Romanian, Moldovan, Ukrainian, Greek, Maltese nationality) was reported to the Trentino AG, including the 28 arrested today, accused in various capacities - among other things - of criminal association aimed at smuggling foreign manufactured tobacco, evasion of assessment or payment of excise duty on energy products and alcoholic beverages, all with the aggravating circumstance of transnational crime. Among these, n. 05 investigated were also reported to the competent Public Prosecutor's Offices as undue applicants and recipients of citizen income.

The Trentino financial police also reconstructed the amount of evaded taxes (excise duties, customs duties and other taxes due) equal to €27.268.161,36, as well as the release for consumption of a further 160 tons of tle and over 16 million liters of alcoholic products.
Today's service operation demonstrates the constant attention of the Guardia di Finanza to protect the economic and financial interests of the European Union.

This includes the action to combat the phenomenon of smuggling, which still represents a widespread crime and constitutes a threat to the budgets of the European Union and national states, but also a potential danger to the health of citizens.

The more strictly procedural phase now opens before the judicial authorities, during which the evidence collected during the investigations will be discussed.