11 precautionary measures for illegal waste trafficking

From this morning, in the provinces of Naples, Milan, Rome, Brindisi, Isernia, Chieti, Caserta, Frosinone and Salerno, the military personnel of the Carabinieri Group for Environmental Protection and Energy Security of Napoli, together with the military personnel of the Provincial Commands competent for the territory, carried out 11 precautionary measures.

Orders signed by the investigating judge of Rome at the request of the DDA, against an equal number of entrepreneurs, owners of transport companies and intermediation companies, who operate in the waste management sector, under investigation for the crimes of organised activity for the illicit trafficking of waste, recycling and self-laundering, illicit management of waste and construction of an illegal landfill.

The investigation, conducted by the Salerno Ecological Operations Unit and coordinated by the Rome District Anti-Mafia Prosecutor's Office, led to the identification of the suspects for repeated actions aimed at carrying out illegal disposal activities of non-hazardous special waste.

In particular, the suspects, using vehicles rented from a third-party company unrelated to the facts, fraudulently obtained, on the one hand, the license plates replaced with duplicate plates registered to a waste transport consortium (unrelated to the facts), and on the other, the preparation of waste identification forms containing false data relating to the disposal site. They received, unknowingly, from companies producing non-hazardous special waste - primarily mixed urban waste - and hazardous special waste - primarily bituminous mixtures - from road resurfacing works, for a total confirmed quantity of approximately 7.000 tons, for illegal disposal, by abandoning it inside a warehouse in the province of Frosinone (RM), on some agricultural land in the provinces of Bari, Brindisi and Lecce, as well as inside a former industrial area in the province of Salerno.

The investigation began with the discovery, in the municipality of Sora (Frosinone), of an industrial warehouse full of bales of special waste, consisting of residues from the recovery/treatment of MSW.

The investigative findings brought to light three distinct phases of the investigation:

the first concerns the management of approximately 860 tons of special waste (plastics and rubber mixed with MSW residues), collected from some Campanian companies and illegally abandoned in the Sora warehouse, regularly rented by one of the suspects;

a second one concerning the management of approximately 126 tons of special waste (residues from the treatment of MSW), coming from recovery plants in Campania and Puglia, subsequently abandoned in Puglia on some land and even, on one occasion, in the parking lot of a supermarket;

a third phase relating to the illicit management of approximately 6.000 tons of various types of special waste, including hazardous waste, coming from producers in the Campania area, abandoned along secondary roads or on uncultivated land.

Approximately 7.000 tons were the estimated quantities of waste disposed of through burning, burial and concealment in agricultural areas and industrial warehouses, which would have allowed the suspects to obtain an unfair profit for a total amount estimated at approximately one million euros. The sums were then the object of illicit financial money laundering operations by the suspects.

In addition to the execution of the 11 precautionary measures, the shares of the two companies, whose owners are believed to be among the main organizers of the waste trafficking, were seized. During the investigation, the warehouse in Sora, several trailers loaded with waste abandoned in a supermarket parking lot in Mesagne (Lecce), and a former industrial area in the municipality of Pontecagnano had already been seized.