Strike against smugglers: Video shows arrests

A total of 205 people were arrested in Austria, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Romania, 92 arrests were made in Lower Austria and Burgenland. The gang is said to have dragged more than 36,100 people. The organization also credits shots at conscripts in Burgenland in January and two suffocated refugees in a small truck in October.

The investigations began in 2021, and a total of 80 tractor vehicles were secured. The people smugglers are said to have made a turnover of around 152 million euros, according to a press conference on Thursday in the Ministry of the Interior in Vienna. Interior Minister Gerhard Karner (ÖVP) announced the details together with Franz Popp, State Police Director of Lower Austria, and Gerhard Braunschmidt, Head of the Burgenland State Criminal Police Office.

“Human lives are worth nothing, it’s about profit”

“It’s one of the greatest successes in the fight against the smuggler mafia in recent years,” said Karner. “With these gangs, a human life is worth nothing, it’s about profit, greed, brutal mafia methods,” said the interior minister and announced that he would continue to take action against human trafficking with all available means.

Since the beginning of 2021, the Burgenland State Criminal Police Office has increasingly observed migrants being smuggled across border crossings in Burgenland and across the green border, which were primarily carried out with vans. These smuggling, in which an average of 30 migrants were transported, all led to the area south of Vienna. The investigations of the criminalists from Burgenland revealed that these journeys could be assigned to a single criminal smuggling organization.

Gang leader managed to escape while in custody

In cooperation with the Romanian police authorities and the Romanian liaison officer, it was determined that the main perpetrator and head of the organization was the 28-year-old Romanian citizen Nicu Gavril O., who was already well known in Austria. The head of the gang was actually already in prison in St. Pölten, but he spectacularly managed to escape in November 2020 after outpatient hospital treatment.

Further investigations led the criminalists to a leading member of the organization residing in Vienna, and the man was placed under surveillance. The investigators also came across a car workshop in Biedermannsdorf that was responsible for converting the tractor vehicles. On January 25, the man was arrested by target investigators in Vienna.

According to the police, he fully confessed during his interrogation and gave the interrogating officers valuable information about the structure of the organization, the locations and the people involved. Ultimately, the criminal organization, which had been built up structurally and organizationally, was broken up by the numerous police authorities.

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