Fraud
Accusation: Withheld millions in social security contributions
A blue light shines under the windshield of a police vehicle.
Lino Mirgeler/dpa/symbol image
Entrepreneurs from the security industry are said to have evaded social security contributions for employees amounting to more than one million euros. The Augsburg public prosecutor’s office therefore ordered searches and the confiscation of possible evidence in two dozen cases in Bavaria and North Rhine-Westphalia on Thursday. More than 150 officers from the main customs offices in Augsburg and Krefeld, customs investigators from Munich and special forces from customs and the police were on duty.
Four of the eleven suspects were arrested – gold and cash worth 150,000 euros were also confiscated. The suspects from the surveillance and security industry are accused of having created bogus invoices in order to finance and cover up undeclared work in the companies. The founding of service companies is said to have concealed the fact that employees were employed without paying the prescribed social security contributions.
