Virtual companies referring to a criminal organisation, infringements of labour and insurance legislation, withholding taxable matter, adulterated drinks and a multitude of counterfeit products have identified, among other things, when carrying out checks across the country of the Directorate-General. Furthermore, the auditors of the IRS in cooperation with Europol have dismantled a fraud ring in Northern Greece, which has been detaching money via the Internet with connections in Bulgaria, Romania and Luxembourg. Examples are the most important audit cases from 01.01.2024 up to now by the Operational Directorates of SDOE Attiki & Macedonia: A. Localization of virtual companies In the context of the execution of a Public Order, a multitude of virtual – non-existent businesses were found, with alleged managers and members of these “sacred people”, persons who, due to their personal situation, were unable to engage in business either were extremely difficult or impossible to identify. Overall, in this case, at least seven legal entities and seventeen natural persons are reported to be involved. The action of the above-mentioned grid of virtual enterprises was found to concentrate the characteristics of the criminal organisation, with a view to the ownership of proportionate taxes and consequently causing criminal financial damage to the State through the publication of virtual documents. In particular, it was found that the existence of persons who had a pivotal-directive role in the criminal organisation, as well as others who had the role to identify and recruit potential ‘swallowers’, and that, as a result of the action taken above, there were losses to the public revenue from the publication of virtual tax documents and, consequently, no return of the VAT ratio of EUR 7,343,893 and also losses due to the failure to submit the required income tax declarations. Moreover, overall, for the above-mentioned undertakings it was found that they have to date outstanding debts to the State totalling EUR 63,735.210. B. Grant checks The IOE carried out checks on legal persons who received grants/subsidies under the Development Act, finding the following: An industrial undertaking was located which did not comply with the conditions of the legislation in force. On the basis of the fact that the company ceased its production process before the 5 years stipulated in the development law, a subsidy of more than EUR 2.5 million was recovered. It was found that a hotel unit in the Region of Thessaly received a subsidy, receiving virtual invoices totalling EUR 760,000. This case has already been dealt with in a Final Report to the competent prosecutor. C. Controls for labour law violations (ARTH 9 Law.4490/2017) In order to address the phenomenon of income avoidance and undeclared or partially and incorrectly declared work, labour and insurance legislation checks were carried out in 273 enterprises, in which 32 undeclared work offences were found, and 147 alleged work offences. For the above infringements involving fines of more than EUR 500,000,00 were prepared and audit reports sent to the competent bodies. D.Registration checks (ARTH 20 Ν.4557/2018) As part of the fight against money laundering from criminal activities, where provision is made for the identification of any natural person holding the legal entity or exercising control over it, checks were carried out by the IOC in a chain of restaurants in South Attica by imposing fines totalling EUR 50,000,00 for non-compliance with the Register of Real Beneficiaries at the headquarters or legal establishment. In addition to the above, 217 undertakings were controlled in which twenty-six infringements concerning non-declaration to the Real Beneficiaries Central Register and an infringement involving late submission were detected. Criminals were fined with a total value of 200,000 euros. E. Smuggling – adulteration – sampling In the context of checks to suppress contraband acts and in particular to combat infringements, identified in the production and trafficking of ethyl alcohol, bottling of illegal alcohol illegitimate and irregular by falsified trademarks of legal bottlers, checks were carried out on seventy-seven undertakings, in which one hundred and forty samples were carried out and four infringements of the trafficking of irregular alcoholic beverages were found, pending responses from the General Chemistry of the State (G.C.) for the remaining sampling cases. F. Fraud & tax evasion checks From checks carried out in 11 companies in the prefecture of Thessaloniki on the subject of retail trade through courier and in a way of payment of cash, a tax avoidance was found in the years 2020 – 2021 due to the failure to issue tax data totaling EUR 753,066,00. Also from a check on an operation “Work Desk” in the city of Thessaloniki, it was found by opening bank accounts to hide taxable matter of EUR 209,482,00, while another audit identified a hiding of EUR 74,800,00. For these cases, Information Reports were prepared and transmitted to the competent A.A. Services. I.E. G. Cooperation with Europol – Dislocation of an international fraud network Using information through the EUROPOL network, an investigation was conducted on a resident of Northern Greece to engage in an international network of Internet fraud with connections in Bulgaria, Romania and Luxembourg. In particular, the international circuit of promising high-performance investments provided falsified documents detaching money, which were found to have resulted in third countries following bank secrecy. In this way, a total of over 500,000,00 euros were deducted to final recipients in Ghana. This case was forwarded to the Department of Recovering Property from Criminal Activities & Mutual Assistance of DG SDOE for further exploitation. H. Counterfeiting checks were carried out in Northern Greece, dealing with counterfeit products and seizures involving 1,583 counterfeit products of a total value of 310,000,00 euros. Five courier companies were also checked in Achaia & Attica from which 8,107 packages were seized which lacked legal documents, of which 1700 packages contained exclusively imitation products (pasts, garments, wallets and perfumes). The final recipients of the funds collected from cash payments corresponding to tens of millions of euros shall be investigated.
The IDOE dismantled a network of frauds in Northern Greece – In the “faca” companies for “bobes” drinks and “monkey” products
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