In continuation of the criminal file regarding the destruction of a smuggling network with tobacco products, border police officers from the central structure, under the coordination of the case prosecutor from the Prosecutor's Office attached to the High Court of Cassation and Justice, last night carried out 3 new searches at locations located within the Călăraşi county, in order to compile the evidentiary material regarding the commission of the crime of producing excisable products that fall under the warehousing regime.
In fact, during the period 21.08.2023-24.08.2023, the criminal prosecution bodies of the General Inspectorate of the Romanian Border Police together with inspectors of the Bucharest Regional Customs Directorate - Mobile Teams and specialized workers of the Romanian Gendarmerie, under the coordination of the Prosecutor's Office near the High Court of Cassation and Justice, continued the procedural activities in question, carrying out new home searches, detaining several postal items and carrying out checks at the headquarters of a commercial company.
Following them, two clandestine tobacco processing facilities and over 2000 kilograms of tobacco were discovered, of which approximately 600 kilograms had already been processed to be suitable for smoking, falling under the provisions of art. 452, para. 1 of Law no. 227/2015 regarding the Fiscal Code.
Thus, as a result of all the activities, more than a ton of processed tobacco, almost 11 tons of leaf tobacco, 2875 plastic buckets and 6 clandestine units where various tobacco processing processes were carried out in totally unsanitary conditions, such as harms the health of people who would have consumed the resulting improper product. The tobacco was processed using specially made shredders in the workshops by people specialized in turning, who also provided the spare parts for the machines made.
At the same time, the investigations carried out in the case led to the identification of over a thousand postal items through which tobacco was offered on E-Commerce platforms and distributed to beneficiaries from all over the country, investigations will be carried out to determine if their facts meet the constitutive content of the offense of the possession by any person of excise products subject to marking over the limit of 1 kg of smoking tobacco or are of a misdemeanor nature and fall under the provisions of art. 449, para. 2, lit. k, being thus liable to be fined from 20,000 lei to 100,000 lei.
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We remind you that, in the same criminal case, on 16 and 17.08.2023, the border police, under the coordination of the case prosecutor from the Prosecutor's Office attached to the High Court of Cassation and Justice, with the support of specialized workers from the Romanian Gendarmerie and The Dolj Regional Customs Directorate, carried out 23 searches in a criminal case regarding the acts committed by several Romanian and Bulgarian citizens who, starting in 2022, organized and introduced into Romania 64 shipments that had as their object almost 330 tons of unprocessed tobacco, for the purpose of processing it in various clandestine units.
The criminal group delivered tobacco from Bulgaria to Romania, using supporting documents for goods that falsely certified that the goods had external beneficiaries, in order to create fictitious commercial circuits that would mislead law enforcement authorities or by evading border control formalities.
From the research, it was established that the tobacco was delivered to beneficiaries in the area of Ilfov, Călăraşi and Dolj counties, later being processed in clandestine units, packaged and distributed throughout the country through some E-Commerce platforms.
As a result of these searches, approximately 10.5 tons of tobacco, three improvised processing facilities, pyrotechnic products, two cars, a minibus, a 7.5-ton truck, three professional scales and sums of money were seized.
In the case, preventive measures were taken against 8 people, two of whom are being investigated under the measure of house arrest, and the other 6 under the measure of judicial control, under the aspect of committing the crimes of the production of excisable products that fall under the warehousing regime, the possession of to any person or the sale on the territory of Romania of excisable products subject to marking, breaking of seals, forgery in documents under private signature, fraudulent crossing of the state border.
The technical support was provided by the workers of the Special Operations Directorate within the IGPR. The whole action benefited from the support of the inspectors of the Bucharest Regional Customs Directorate - the Mobile Team Office, and the international cooperation activities were carried out with the support of OLAF - the European Anti-Fraud Office and SELEC - the South-East European Law Enforcement Center and the General Directorate of Combating Organized Crime in Bulgaria.
