SAN VITO DEI NORMANNI – The Carabinieri of the Compagnia di San Vito dei Normanni and the Carabinieri Anti-Counterfeiting Command – Cryptocurrency Section of Rome, after a detailed and complex investigation activity directed and coordinated by the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Brindisi, proceeded with the notification of the notice of conclusion of the preliminary investigations issued by the Brindisi Prosecutor’s Office against ten people (seven originally from the province of Bari and three from the province of Brindisi) aged between 24 and 40, all held responsible in various capacities of the crimes of illicit possession and dealing of different types of narcotic substances (methadone, ketamine, hashish and marijuana), as well as the crimes of possession of false identity documents and self-laundering. At the same time, the military executed a preventive seizure decree issued by the GIP at the Court of Brindisi, again at the request of the local Public Prosecutor’s Office, against two of the main suspects, of sums of money and values consisting of virtual currency ( cryptocurrencies), active balances present on ten prepaid cards attributable to them, for a total amount of €3,300.00, to be considered, therefore, profit from the previous drug transfer activity.
Basically, the investigations made it possible to ascertain that:
- the two main suspects managed, through the use of the “Telegram or Whatsapp” applications, a virtual drug dealing center capable of supplying customers resident throughout Italy to whom they were sent, with the help of postal services, and upon payment through top-ups on prepaid cards or bank transfers, the aforementioned narcotic substances. In the period between the months of March and September 2022, through the analysis of the aforementioned IT platforms, 150 sales of narcotic substances were detected. Furthermore, the logistical and sorting base for the different types of narcotic substances that the two managed to traffic throughout the Italian territory was identified in the municipality of Latiano;
- through the cross-analysis of the seized IT exhibits and the financial documentation, the suspects, in the period between 15.03.2021 and 04.03.2022, used the money deriving from the drug dealing activity in financial and speculative investment operations in cryptocurrencies (virtual currency/bitcoin), through cash transfers for a total amount of €30,633.99;
The preventive seizure (preventative and aimed at mandatory confiscation extended due to disproportion), adopted by the GIP of the Court of Brindisi at the request of the local Public Prosecutor’s Office, constitutes one of the first real precautionary measures of virtual currency and the logical consequence of the synergistic investigative activity, directed and coordinated by the Prosecutor’s Office of Brindisi and carried out by the Territorial Armed Forces Departments, in particular by the Provincial Carabinieri Command of Brindisi and the Cryptocurrency Section of Rome (recently established and part of the Carabinieri Anti-Counterfeiting Command of Rome, with the task of combating at a national level the emerging criminal dynamics, linked to the illicit use of cryptocurrencies and the use of illegal IT platforms for the sale of currency and other illicit products).
