Pozzuoli and Quarto: Carabinieri operation targeting gangmasters and drug dealing: two arrests and eight reports

A massive, high-impact enforcement operation has gripped the Phlegraean Fields since early morning, revealing a dense web of illegal activities ranging from gangmastering to drug dealing. Carabinieri officers from the Pozzuoli branch, deployed in several municipalities in the area, have drawn a staggering tally of 269 identified individuals, 131 vehicles checked, and 68 traffic tickets issued, amounting to a total of approximately €47,000. Investigators have particularly focused on the phenomenon of undeclared labor, gangmastering, and the trade in counterfeit products, plagues that fuel a silent army of workers who travel at dawn from Piazza Garibaldi in Naples to reach the province's seaside resorts. At the Cumana terminal in Licola, the military intercepted and stopped the phenomenon of illegal shuttles operated by non-EU citizens, who, aboard vans or private cars, waited for their compatriots to transport them to the fields or along the kilometers of coastline, ready to resell illegal goods to beachgoers.

Tensions escalated when officers from the Licola station spotted a Fiat Doblò with four foreigners aboard. The driver, a thirty-six-year-old, failed to stop at the patrol's command, sparking a dangerous chase through the city streets before the occupants abandoned the vehicle to attempt a desperate escape on foot. This ended shortly afterward with all the fugitives being stopped and reported. A total of four unlicensed drivers were reported for organizing this illegal taxi service. During road and local checks, a fifty-two-year-old was reported for being caught driving a car with foreign license plates and a forged registration document, while a seventeen-year-old was charged with reckless evasion after forcing a roadblock. A fifty-nine-year-old man was found in possession of an eight-centimeter box cutter and will be charged with illegal possession of a weapon, while a fifty-year-old man was reported for escape after being caught outside his home despite being under house arrest.

The Carabinieri's activity also dealt a severe blow to drug dealing in the area, leading to the arrest of two convicted criminals. Carabinieri from the Quarto station arrested Antonio Passaretti, a forty-seven-year-old local man already known to law enforcement, after he was caught red-handed while selling a dose to a buyer, who was later reported to the Prefecture. The subsequent search seized ten grams of cocaine and one hundred and thirty euros in cash, resulting in the man's transfer to prison. In Pozzuoli, officers from the local station arrested Pietro Restivo, a forty-year-old from Giugliano, seizing from his possession one hundred and twenty-five grams of marijuana, a one hundred and thirty-five-gram block of hashish, a drug-laced knife, and a staggering two thousand two hundred and thirty-five euros in cash, believed to be the proceeds of the illegal activity. The arrested man was placed under house arrest pending trial.