Naples: State Police has executed personal precautionary measures against 7 individuals for criminal association and illegal waste trafficking

In the morning of 13 February, State Police, by delegation of District Anti-Mafia Directorate of Naples, has executed an enforcement order of personal precautionary measures issued by the GIP of the Court of Naples against 7 subjects, held responsible for the crime of criminal association, illicit waste trafficking having ferrous material as its object and recycling of large quantities of copper.

The operation is the result of a complex investigative activity, corroborated by telephone and environmental interceptions, observation services and shadowing, which allowed to reconstruct a complex and tested illicit system of collection, transport and disposal of metal waste, managed by a criminal organization operating in the Campania and Lazio regions.

The investigation has revealed serious conduct aimed atalteration of the traceability of ferrous materials, proceeds from thefts to the detriment of companies such as Italian State Railways, telephone operators and electricity suppliers, with the aim of reintroducing them into the market, once they have been documented clean, through unauthorized circuits, ensuring huge profits for the acolytes.

In particular, from the results acquired during the investigations, it clearly emerged that recycling of large quantities of copper, a phenomenon closely linked to the much better known theft of copper cables taken along the railway line which causes, in addition to the economic damage to the company that manages railway traffic, serious repercussions on the regularity of train circulation and major inconvenience to users.

La Judicial Police Team of the Naples Railway Police Department coordinated by DDA of Naples, with the collaboration in the executive phase by the staff of the Polfer Departments Lazio and Emilia Romagna, has dismantled an organised mechanism, which involved numerous companies by means of fictitious passages, front men, fabricated documents and simulated transports, it was possible to mask the stealthy origin of metallic materials, with the purpose of reintroduce them into the supply chain legal; the materials, once legitimized, were transported at the metallurgical companies of northern Italy.

Some companies, especially located in lower Lazio, they gave in ferrous materials (first of all copper), proceeds from previous theft or other crimes, in favor of the Campania subjects affected by the personal measure under examination.

At the time of the transfer and then of the transport, some documents were filled out artifact documents, aimed at hiding the nature of the illegal cargo conducted (that is, without the indication of the copper and other metals received from the manufacturing companies, or by indicating a lower weight to the real one), its origin from the transferor company or the first destination of the materials; on some occasions, the cargo travelled without documentation and, subsequently, the so-called 'bubble spin', that is to say the ad hoc preparation or the change of the documentation accompanying the load, always capable of hindering the verification of theauthentic origin (and the real destination) of the metals.

During the operation, in addition to the personal restrictive measures, they were subjected to preventive seizure different vehicles used for the illegal transportation of waste and a company, the main manufacturing and selling company ferrous waste of illicit origin in favor of the association.

The investigation in question is part of the ongoing action taken by the Police and the Judiciary to environmental protection and in fight against organized crime, counteracting phenomena that threaten order, the environment, public health and the legal economy provoking economic damage to companies operating in key sectors for the community.