In one vehicle, a smuggler transported and fled four migrants from their disembarkation point in the area of Rhodes airport
A criminal organization in Rhodes that trafficked illegal immigrants from Turkey to Greece was dismantled. The arrest of its members and the dismantling of the organization were carried out by the officers of the Security Office of the Port Authority of Rhodes and the Echelon of the Special Missions of Rhodes, with the assistance of officers of the Directorate of Security and Protection of Maritime Borders (DAPTHAS), and the National Intelligence Service (E .Y.P.) after a wide police operation in Rhodes. The members of this criminal organization also took care of the accommodation of illegal immigrants in Rhodes while facilitating their promotion inland.
They were all arrested ten foreigners as members of the criminal organization (five Syrian nationals aged 16, 20, 25, 27 and 44, two Turkish nationals aged 22 and 29, one Palestinian national aged 35, one Moldovan national aged 32, one Syrian national aged 47) and one 53-year-old citizen.
In particular, in the context of the use of information and a coordinated police operation, on July 24 a patrol boat of the Coast Guard-Hellenic Coast Guard detected a suspicious yacht disembarking a sufficient number of foreigners on the Kerameni coast of the Monolith of Rhodes and then moving towards the opposite Turkish beach. With the use of light and sound signals, the PLS stopped the T/C boat, in which the 22-year-old operator and his 29-year-old assistant (both Turkish nationals) were on board. At the same time, a total of eleven foreigners were detected in the wider land area of Monolithos, who were taken to the Central Port Authority of Rhodes. As part of the preliminary investigation, the 22-year-old and the 29-year-old were identified as the skipper and assistant of the T/C boat and were arrested as smugglers of foreigners from the Turkish coast opposite Rhodes, while the T/C boat was confiscated as a means of transport.
In the context of a coordinated operation from land, two I.X.E. vehicles. With one vehicle, a smuggler transported and fled four migrants from their disembarkation point in the area of Rhodes airport. He then hid the vehicle inside a fenced area of a luxury residence in the area of Kremasti. The same trafficker together with three other foreigners in the other vehicle was located in the city of Rhodes, where they were all arrested. Earlier, the traffickers in question had gone to various points in the city of Rhodes to monitor the patrol boats of the LS-EL.AKT and their movements. In fact, they not only supervised the points where the illegal immigrants disembarked from the T/C boat but also the land route from which they were then transported.
Lawful house searches were conducted, with the presence of a judicial officer, in three houses, two of which were safehouses and the third was the aforementioned luxury residence, where members of the organization also lived. During house searches, a total of thirty-one foreigners without legal documents were found, while an additional five foreigners were arrested. A legal search was also carried out at the home and in the professional area of the citizen arrested.
In total, during the conducted investigations, one T/C vessel, three I.X.E. vehicles, twenty mobile telephone devices, one external hard drive, one file storage device (usb stick), one laptop, the sum of seven thousand euros, thirty-four identity cards from other countries, eleven Greek asylum cards of doubtful authenticity, one a Spanish residence permit of doubtful authenticity, a French driver’s license and sixteen passports of various countries of doubtful authenticity.
The organized circuit in question operated with distinct roles according to which the leading figure allegedly coordinated and communicated with the traffickers from Turkey on when and where in Rhodes a boat with illegal immigrants would arrive. The other members of the ring would pick them up from the respective beach of the island, then hide them from the Greek authorities by taking them to safe houses and take care of supplying them with forged travel documents in order to then forward them inland. The profit of the criminal organization from the illegal transfer of migrants from Turkey to Rhodes amounted to 6,000 euros per head.
The Maritime Border Security and Protection Directorate (DAPTHAS) analyzes and processes in depth the evidence that has emerged and investigates the possible extension of the activities of the members of the criminal organization to other islands of the Eastern Aegean, as well as their cooperation with other members of organized circuits, both in our country and abroad, with the same or similar criminal activities.
Source: Skai
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