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The cars were stolen, illegally re-registered and then resold in the process. Police have dismantled a well-oiled car trafficking network in Marseille. Fifteen suspects were arrested in this investigation, three of them were remanded in custody after being indicted.
INFO ACTU17. The case began with the reporting of numerous car thefts throughout 2020. Each time, these vehicles were in the large seaport of Marseille at the time of their disappearance. An investigation was opened and the departmental security police officers and their colleagues from the Bouches-du-Rhône Interministerial Research Group (GIR) were in charge of the investigations.
The work of the investigators has borne fruit as they have identified many suspects according to our information. The latter engaged in an important and juicy traffic of vehicles which, once stolen, were made up, before being resold.
To do this, the criminals opened fictitious companies in order to be able to re-register cars with falsified registration cards. Some mentions were intentionally wrong on the document, which also allowed traffickers to evade certain state taxes.
Almost 350,000 euros and 17 vehicles seized
A total of fifteen suspects, thirteen men and two women aged 35 to 55 – one aged 75 – have been arrested and taken into custody in recent weeks.
The police seized 17 vehicles, nearly 55,000 euros in cash and two Rolex luxury watches worth 20,000 euros, specifies a source close to the investigation. The police also got hold of nearly 300,000 euros which was in three different bank accounts.
Three men were brought before the examining magistrate in charge of the case on Wednesday March 17. They were indicted before being imprisoned. The other suspects were left free at this stage of the proceedings. Further investigations will make it possible to determine what precise role each of the suspects had in this vast trafficking.
Last month, the police in Argenteuil (Val-d’Oise) also dismantled an important traffic of cars which were stolen then brought to the port of Antwerp (Belgium), to be then sold abroad. Three men were remanded in custody in this case, two others were released under judicial supervision.
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