On behalf of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office, Italian police have been able to uncover a large-scale criminal network.
The operation, which was carried out in 20 cities in the Marche region of Italy, revealed a “Chinese underground bank”. It was equipped with illegal and hidden bank offices used to collect, store and return money to be laundered. The operation used 250 financial police officers, a helicopter, four dog units and scanning equipment to search for hidden compartments.
The criminal gang is suspected of having evaded payments of over one billion kroner in VAT.
Among other things, they allegedly used ghost companies that imported hundreds of containers of clothes and accessories from China to Italy. And with the help of an advanced scheme that extended to Bulgaria and Greece, the origin of the goods could be concealed.
Five restaurants and a shopping center were seized
According to the evidence, the illegal profits were laundered with the help of secret branches in the Italian region of Marche. The transfer abroad was carried out, among other things, through shell companies and false invoices. The money passed through a number of European countries such as Bulgaria, Denmark, Estonia, France, Ireland, Germany and the United Kingdom before the money arrived in China.
During the house search carried out by the Italian financial police, extensive documentation was found. With that, it was possible, among other things, to execute a freezing order of 116 million euros against 33 suspects. Five Chinese restaurants, a shopping mall, a house and an apartment belonging to the suspects were seized.
On Friday, police were able to arrest seven people.