Brescia, “Sweet Water” operation: drugs and tax evasion worth 32 million euros, 18 arrests

Brescia, in the early hours of the morning, in the provinces of Brescia, Milano, Bergamo, Mantua, Lodi, Alessandria, Novara, Varese, Parma, Piacenza, the Carabinieri of the Provincial Command of Brescia, with the collaboration of the soldiers of the provinces involved, have implemented an order of personal and real precautionary measure issued by the GIP of Brescia, who agreed with the solid evidentiary framework collected and documented by the Brescia Investigation Unit, under the coordination of the District Anti-Mafia Directorate of Brescia. The provision was carried out against 30 people, held in various capacities responsible for "criminal association" aimed at committing tax crimes and/or embezzlement in order to facilitate some companies in the systematic evasion of income and value taxes added, through the issuing of invoices for non-existent operations and consequent "fraudulent transfer of values". Conduct relating to the possession for the purpose of dealing of large quantities of drugs (hashish and cocaine) was also ascertained and contested.

In detail, the aforementioned measure consisted of:

• No. 15 OCC in prison (11 for criminal association);
• No. 3 arrest warrants and submission to AA.DD;
• Nr. 11 orders of disqualification from the profession of commercial entrepreneur and administrator of commercial companies for 1 year;
• No. 51 preventive seizures of the below-mentioned movable and immovable assets, aimed at both direct and equivalent confiscation, for a total sum of approximately 13 million euros as proceeds of illicit activities:

company shares of no. 4 commercial companies;

1 villa in Chiari;

4 apartments in the province of Brescia, Milano and Bergamo;

7 garages;

1 commercial warehouse;

6 proportional shares of housing;

5 proportional shares of garages;

2 lands located in the province of Brescia;

250 current accounts in Italy;

Cash.

The investigation, called "SWEET WATER", originates from the seizure of 31 kg of hashish with the simultaneous arrest of 3 criminals, carried out on 22.07.2018 in Rezzato (BS) by the Carabinieri of Brescia.

The subsequent investigative development, started in October 2018, made it possible to identify a criminal association aimed at committing tax crimes.

A criminal association, with international ramifications, aimed at importing hashish and cocaine from Spain, destined for the Brescia area, was also identified.

In detail, the investigations made it possible to identify the "instigator" of the aforementioned drug shipment in LABINELLI Massimo, a convicted criminal from Brescia, living permanently in Spain.

Furthermore, a criminal was identified, BERTOZZI Giovanni who, with the collaboration of MARZOLI Bruno Claudio, is believed to be the promoter and coordinator of an organization dedicated to tax evasion and the monetization of large sums of money through foreign current accounts, thanks to the fundamental complicity of an expert tax accountant, FAMILIARI Giuseppe. The aforementioned, in fact, thanks to a compliant accountant and other Italian and foreign accomplices, carried out a complex criminal scheme based on the issuing of invoices for non-existent operations, which allowed the entire organization to transfer sums of money, in the accounting years 2018- 2019, for at least €32.407.162,07.

The criminal project consisted of the establishment of temporary "paper mill" companies fictitiously registered in the name of knowledgeable and paid "front men", through which multiple invoices were issued for non-existent operations, worth hundreds of thousands of euros, in favor of actually existing compliant companies and regularly operating in the construction, textile or metal processing sectors.

The latter, upon receipt of the agreed false invoice, arranged an equivalent bank transfer to the current account address of the "paper mill" with the dual purpose of giving an appearance of lawfulness to the commercial operation which was in reality only simulated and thus obtaining the transfer of the sums of money. As soon as the payment was received on the "paper mills" account, the suspects sent the same sums to foreign current accounts (in France, Hungary, Bulgaria and China), managed by MERLO Maurizio with the collaboration of his two sons, Francesco and Luca, and registered to compliant companies which, through the complicity of a Chinese citizen, monetized the money with cash withdrawals, returned to the suspects who, in turn, returned it to the administrators of the actually operating companies who had collected the fictitious invoice and arranged the first transfer ( obviously net of the price of the crime established overall at around 7% of each false invoice issued and paid). By doing so, i.e. by simulating expenses that had never actually been incurred (since, as seen, the money transferred was then returned), the actual operating companies involved in the illicit activity, in addition to having large sums of cash of illicit origin, obtained the erosion of its tax base for income tax purposes, functional to significant tax evasion (both direct and indirect taxes). The subsequent seizure of the accounting records, ordered by the AG against all the companies involved, confirmed the investigative framework that emerged in the first phase, allowing us to better outline the various criminal responsibilities of each suspect and quantify the tax evasion for a amount much higher than 9 million euros for the year 2018 and part of 2019 alone.