“It is not the cartridge brought back discreetly from the principality of Andorra nor a pack of cigarettes resold on the street corner, but rather a large-scale traffic in the transport and resale of counterfeit cigarettes,” says Jean in the preamble. -Luc Ybre, the president of the first chamber of the Bordeaux criminal court, this Monday, June 24. Smuggling, fraudulent sales without the status of tobacco seller and participation in a criminal association which resulted in ten men aged between 21 and 38 being tried since yesterday in Bordeaux based on their involvement.
Sprawling investigation
On March 12, 2021, a motorist arriving from the Paris region was checked by customs officers at the Virsac tollbooth. Twenty-five boxes filled with cartons of cigarettes were seized from his vehicle. The starting point of a sprawling investigation by the Customs Judicial Financial Investigation Service (SEJF).
From telephone interceptions to physical surveillance, from investigations into contacts to checks on car and box rentals, from hearings to studies on transfers of funds and lifestyles, from transactions to seizures and arrests, the agents will follow and trace the smugglers and the tobacco that turns out to be counterfeit. “It is no longer just taxes that are evaded, but it is also a public health problem,” summarizes the president.
A cartridge bought for 105 euros on the so-called authentic market was bought for 25 to 30 euros and resold for 50 to 70 euros
The investigators will also specify the role of each person: the two principals, semi-wholesalers and resellers, the manager of a real call center for orders, the deliverers and sellers, the transporters and money collectors, and a supplier in the Paris region.
The tobacco, loaded in the Paris region or in Spain in opening and carrying vehicles, was then resold in cartridges in Lormont, Bègles, Gradignan, Mérignac, Talence, Pessac, Villenave-d’Ornon or Saint-Médard-en-Jalles… Prices offered on social networks thus defied all competition since a cartridge purchased for 105 euros on the so-called authentic market was purchased for 25 to 30 euros and resold for 50 to 70 euros.
Kicked out of the room
If the defendants admit to having resold tobacco without being a dealer, they refute any idea of money laundering and criminal association. In the box, one of the two detained defendants denies the pivotal role assigned to him. “I’m not an organizer, there’s no organization, I’m all alone. I made money on my own. The others, I don’t know,” he says about his co-defendants.
GUILLAUME BONNAUD/SO
Me Sylvie Reulet is the lawyer for a defendant described by the prosecution as an order giver. A pivotal role in trafficking that he denies.
Casual, provocative and dissipated, the other inmate is expelled from the room in the morning before returning to take full responsibility for the traffic in the afternoon. In the wrong place at the wrong time to sell truck seats and not cigarettes, cartridges found in the trash, telephone lines and email addresses hacked: at the helm, the explanations are sometimes fanciful.
“It was survival,” said another. “I did this to help myself out. It’s done, it’s done, we all make mistakes. » “Everyone was arrested, I didn’t think that the facts were so serious and that I would be associated with criminals. » The trial ends this Tuesday, June 25.
