Those arrested, with the case filed against them, were taken to the competent prosecutor’s office.
The Athens Airports Police Directorate proceeded to dismantle a transnational criminal organization, whose members were active in the illegal transportation of foreigners inside the country and in facilitating their exit to other European countries, through the Athens International Airport, by providing them with the necessary travel documents.
In the context of a large-scale police operation that took place on Tuesday, December 20, in various areas of Attica and Thessaloniki, were arrested a total of 18 people.
As the director of the Athens Airport Police Department, Lieutenant General Konstantinos Markopoulos, said in his statements about the case, the police, in this success, dealt a critical blow to the organized circuits of illegal transportation of foreigners both in Greece and in the rest of the European countries . Additionally, he noted that the circuit, which the investigation found operated in a professional manner, had been active at least since January 2022.
For the investigation and clarification of the case, an appropriate evaluation and utilization of information and data was preceded, while special investigative operations were implemented, in the context of which the mode of action of the criminal organization (modus operandi) was established.
Specifically, the members of the organization picked up the immigrants who had entered the country illegally mainly from forested areas of Evros, using rented, stolen or “business” vehicles, and then transported them either directly to pre-departure safe houses in Thessaloniki or to a forest area.
Subsequently, the perpetrators, using vehicles bearing foreign number plates, transported them to pre-departure safe houses in Athens where they provided them with the necessary travel documents, fake or genuine, of other persons, with which they sought, through the Athens Airport, to travel in European countries.
Alternatively, some of the trafficked persons were transported using city buses in the area of ​​Thessaloniki, from where they were picked up by vehicles and taken to the northern borders of the country, which they crossed on foot with the help of foreigners.
From the searches carried out as part of the operation, in houses and shops, they were found and confiscated 12 company vehicles, 136 travel documents, of which 110 are genuine, €48,020, 69 mobile phones, a money counting machine and 61 grams of crystal methamphetamine.
Those arrested, with the case filed against them, were taken to the competent prosecutor’s office.
RES-EMP
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