Dutch police crackdown on multi-million euro carousel fraud
The authorities in the Netherlands have dismantled an alleged criminal syndicate
The authorities in the Netherlands have dismantled an alleged criminal syndicate suspected of a complex multi-million euro VAT fraud scheme involving the online sale of electronic devices. cost the European Union up to 170 billion euros ($ 206 billion) each year.
By far the most popular version of such schemes, carousel fraud involves dissolving companies in the course of cross-border sales to claim counterfeit refunds from The respective tax authorities in different countries.
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Europol, the European network for police cooperation, said on Friday that the recent operation was made possible thanks to the collaboration of other agencies in Croatia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland.
A series of thirteen House searches were carried out earlier in the week as part of the operation, which resulted in the seizure of equipment and communications documents It is understood that the alleged perpetrators stole nine million euros ($ 11 million) in illegal tax claims under of counterfeit online sales of SD memory cards between 2017 and 2019.
Authorities have not yet revealed side whether arrests have been made.
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Previous efforts to effectively investigate and prosecute cross-border VAT schemes like this have been seriously hampered by the fact that under the current agreement, national authorities only have jurisdiction to prosecute these crimes when they occur within their borders
Defenders hope that a new EU body, the European Public Prosecutor’s Office, will make law enforcement more efficient by streamlining cooperation between member state authorities, reducing the average timeframe for these investigations spanning several months to a matter of days.
OCCRP / TechConflict.Com