Six Georgian citizens have been arrested in Lanzarote in an operation by the National Police and the Irish Garda Siochana, coordinated by Europol, against the illegal trafficking of citizens for the commission of crimes against property in Europe, which has resulted in more than a hundred arrests in different countries.
According to the National Police, the agents have arrested five people, three of the ringleaders of the organization in Dublin (Ireland) and two in Barcelona. In addition, it points out that 125 Georgian citizens with false documentation have been arrested at different airports in Spain, France, Italy and Portugal who, allegedly, had the objective of committing crimes against property in homes and businesses throughout Europe.
In the records, around 300 false documents from various countries of the European Union, useful for falsification, numerous computers and smartphones, money transfer receipts, multiple credit cards, plane tickets and agendas with annotations and contacts have been seized.
Ringleaders based in Dublin
The investigation began when agents of the National Police detected an organization dedicated to facilitating the transit through various European airports of Georgian citizens with false documentation. The purpose of these people was, presumably, to commit crimes against property -robberies with force and thefts in homes and businesses- and the false identities were provided to them by the criminal network to travel through different countries of the Union without being identified.
The members of the organization recruited young people in Georgia who intended to flee their country seeking a more prosperous future in the United Kingdom or the United States. To do this, they traveled by plane to different European airports with Georgian passports valid to enter the Schengen area.
The ringleaders of the organization had established themselves in Dublin, from where they distributed false documents from various countries of the European Union by mail or through an intermediary. The latter resided in Georgia, and only traveled to Europe when they had to participate in the trafficking of a person or group, making part of the journey with the trafficked or helping them in the management of the plane ticket or accommodation.
On other occasions, the trafficked were received in the country of transit by another contact of the organization, sporadic members who played the role of "travel agent" and helped them with accommodation and tickets until their departure to the final destination with the false identity.
Operation coordinated by Europol
Once all the information was analyzed, the agents established a joint device with the Irish police coordinated by EUROPOL. For this, several Spanish agents traveled to Dublin where they arrested the three main ringleaders of the organization and carried out two home entries and searches. In addition, in Barcelona they arrested the organization's contacts in Spain. All the detainees are of Georgian nationality.
In the operation carried out in Dublin, two searches were carried out in homes where about 300 false documents from various countries of the European Union, useful for falsification, numerous computers and smartphones, money transfer receipts, multiple credit cards, plane tickets and agendas with annotations and contacts were seized.
A total of 125 arrests for document forgery
The investigation allowed the arrest of 125 Georgians for document forgery in various Spanish airports -Madrid (11), Barcelona (35), Alicante (6), Valencia (5), Murcia (5), Málaga (1), Santiago de Compostela (8), Gran Canaria (2), Santander (13), Palma de Mallorca (7), Lanzarote (6), Tenerife Sur (5), Fuerteventura (3), Girona (3), Reus (1) and Bilbao (1)-; and in French, Italian and Portuguese terminals.
All the detainees were allegedly part of the cells dedicated to robberies in homes and are, in the opinion of the investigators, responsible for a large part of the robberies in homes committed in Spain, and a large part of Europe, during the last 15 years being led by "Thieves in Law", the highest rank in ex-Soviet organized crime.
