"Perseverant" operation by the Carabinieri: drugs in the Gioia Tauro plain (RC) travel online.

18 suspects subjected to precautionary measures. This is the result of the "Perseverant" investigation, coordinated by the Prosecutor Emanuele Crescenti and the Deputy Prosecutor Davide Lucisano of the Palmi Prosecutor's Office and conducted by the Carabinieri of the Provincial Command of Reggio Calabria, concerning a complex round of drug dealing, the result strongly rooted within the territorial context of the Municipalities of Taurianova and Rosarno.

It was the Carabinieri who started the investigations complaint brought by the father of a young drug user who, given the bad slope that the daughter was taking, had decided to lay aside his parental pride and confide the girl's addiction to the Carabinieri at the Taurianova station.

The subsequent insights made by the investigators, started in March 2020 and concluded years later, they ascertained man's fears, finding the existence of a thriving market of light and heavy drugs, based in Taurianova and branches in Rosarno, Platì and Gerocarne, where the narcotic suppliers were based.

THEillegal activity was not interrupted even during the Covid pandemic, whose restrictions were widely circumvented by the suspects who, to reduce the risk of controls, they had put their cars aside and started delivering the narcotic by bicycle, directly to the buyers' homes. To maintain contact with the latter, given the ban on gatherings, all communications were carried out online, with channels Telegram, or other messaging applications, dedicated precisely to matching the supply and demand of narcotics. Numerous transfers were found, however a turnover that investigators have estimated to exceed one million euros.

On the basis of the evidence thus collected, according to the accusation hypothesis supported by the Palmi GIP who signed the precautionary order, it is believed that the suspects, thanks to supply sources in Italy and abroad, at least fifty criminal events are involved.

The evidentiary value of the numerous recoveries of various narcotic substances, primarily cocaine and marijuana, made by the investigators, with arrests in the act of 9 of today's arrested. In particular, the Judge considered of fundamental importance the discovery of an Indian hemp plantation, housed in a bunker hidden by an agricultural shed.

There, three meters below the ground, the suspects had meticulously set up hydroponic systems, complete with heating, ventilation and lighting with UV lamps, intended for the management of various Indian hemp cultivars, differentiated by their drug-inducing potential. In the absence of the intervention of the military personnel, the narcotic, processed in doses, would have allowed the suspects to obtain profits of no less than 200.000 euros.

The proceeding is currently pending in the investigation phase and the actual responsibility of the persons receiving the precautionary measure, together with the validity of the accusations made against them, will be examined during the subsequent trial. Further investigative and evidentiary developments cannot be ruled out, including in favor of the people under investigation.

Lastly, the investigation also shed light on mistreatment which the wife and daughter of one of those arrested had to endure in silence for years. Rendered incapable of reporting, forced to live in seclusion, daily humiliated and repeatedly beaten up, the two women have now been rescued by the Carabinieri and removed from this painful and demeaning coexistence.