The Customs Surveillance Service of the Tax Agency, in collaboration with the French Customs, has dismantled an organisation run by Spanish citizens that was dedicated to sending large shipments of smuggled tobacco to other European countries.
The organisation had several warehouses in Catalonia and Navarra where tobacco was placed in boxes of car spare parts for later shipment to its destination.
As a result of the operation, called ‘Peirún’, nine members of the organisation have been arrested, six of them of Spanish nationality, two Brazilians and one Portuguese, and more than 1,400,000 packs have been seized, with a market value estimated at more than six million euro, and 14.5 tonnes of tobacco, which has been one of the largest seizures of the year in terms of smuggled tobacco.
The joint actions begin with the intervention in France, at the end of last March, of a truck loaded with 14,500 kilos of tobacco that was heading to Spain. The arrest carried out by the La Rochelle Brigade of the French Customs began a series of combined investigations for alleged smuggling and criminal organisation crimes in relation to an organisation that used a transport company with Portuguese trucks to move important shipments of smuggled tobacco between European countries.
Surveillance and intervention of cargo
As a result of the surveillance work deployed by Customs Surveillance officials of Catalonia, the Basque Country and Navarra, it was determined that the organisation introduced merchandise into Spain through the Gipuzkoan town of Irún, and that it had different warehouses in Navarra and Catalonia where it stored the tobacco that was later sent to other European countries through the border of La Jonquera (Girona).
In June, Girona Customs Surveillance officials detected one of the trucks passing through La Jonquera that had previously been seen in a guarded warehouse in El Vendrell (Tarragona). Immediately the alert is given to the French Customs, whose Perpignan Brigade locates the vehicle and, in the subsequent inspection, intervenes 350,000 packs of tobacco of the brand ‘Sixt’ hidden inside boxes of automobile spare parts, detaining in turn the two drivers, of Brazilian nationality.
The investigations continue and at the end of last November, the Girona and Basque Country Customs Surveillance officials are tracking another truck that was heading to a warehouse in El Vendrell, observing, again, that the same type of merchandise is loaded in the warehouse, and they detect that the transport is once again destined for Italy, this time starting from the port of Barcelona. The officials intervened the truck and discovered 452,000 packs of tobacco from the brand ‘Regina’, again hidden in boxes of car spare parts, which led to the arrest of the driver, a Portuguese national.
Registration in Tarragona and last arrests
At that time, the El Vendrell warehouse was searched and the person responsible, a Spanish national, arrested. Inside the unit, another 667,000 packs of tobacco from the latter brand were found and more boxes of automobile spare parts, for which reason the person in charge of the warehouse, a Spanish national, was arrested.
At a later date, several searches were carried out, two of them in Italy with the collaboration of the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF), one in Navarra and the other in Barcelona, and the arrest of the other five members of the organisation, all of Spanish nationality.
