In the early hours of dawn, the Flying Squad of the Bolzano Police Headquarters, with the collaboration of the Flying Squads of Modena and Pesaro, of the Crime Prevention Department of the State Police and of a Canine Unit of the Police Headquarters of Florence and Padua, carried out the execution to 26 Search Decrees issued by the District Anti-Mafia Directorate of the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Trento against as many subjects under investigation for criminal association aimed at dealing in narcotic substances.
The police operation carried out this morning, called “Twilight”, originates from the conclusion of a previous investigation, “Malok 2021”, aimed at monitoring and defeating the new criminal structures that have arisen in recent years with the aim of controlling the various ” of drug dealing to those present in the capital of Bolzano.
Specifically, with the “Malok 2021” Operation, the Bolzano investigators of the State Police and the Guardia di Finanza were able to dismantle the clans made up of Albanian drug dealers who had set up their base in Via Roma. The vacuum generated by those arrests had seen the rise of 4 different drug dealing gangs, independent of each other but interconnected as regards the operating methods and sources of supply of narcotic substances, which had divided their areas of influence in this way:
- One operating in the Don Bosco neighborhood,
- One operating in the Europa district,
- One operating in the Piani district,
- One operating in the Oltrisarco neighbourhood.
The detailed and complex investigation activity, which lasted over a year, allowed the State Police of the Bolzano Police Headquarters to dismantle the aforementioned criminal groups active in the capital, as well as to identify and eliminate the main drug supply channel, located in Emilia Romagna , in Modena, where at dawn today one of the searches was carried out on the person who usually acted as a courier/transporter of narcotic substances from the Emilian capital to the Bolzano capital.
The investigative activities also made it possible to closely monitor “retail dealing” in our capital, which involved numerous pushers: in this regard, it was possible to document over 1300 sales of narcotic substances (almost exclusively heroin and cocaine) to drug addicts Bolzanini or residents of the South Tyrolean Province.
Overall, as mentioned above, the long and complex investigation concluded today involved, in total, 26 subjects (12 Tunisian citizens, 1 Algerian citizen, 3 Moroccan citizens, 3 Albanian citizens and 7 Italian citizens, all convicted), under investigation as they are accused, jointly, of being part of the 4 criminal associations mentioned above. Of these 26, 9 were arrested in the act of drug dealing, 5 of them are still detained in prison in Trento, Bolzano and Foggia, while 1 is currently held at the CPR in Ponte Galeria (Rome) awaiting release as soon as possible. repatriated to Tunisia. The remaining 16 drug dealers searched today were reported to be free.
A significant fact that has emerged – and, to be honest, very rare – is that relating to the presence of women at the highest levels in the organizational management of the criminal gangs under investigation: 7 of these 26 subjects are women.
The seizures carried out concerned over 1 kg of cocaine and heroin, 50 g of hashish and marijuana, and the sum of 18 thousand euros, proceeds from drug dealing.
At the disposal of the Police Commissioner of the Province of Bolzano Paolo Sartori, the individual positions of the suspects are now being examined by the Anti-Crime Division of the Police Headquarters, for the purposes of applying specific Personal Prevention Measures provided for by the Code of Anti-Mafia Laws towards them.
Investigations are still underway aimed at verifying the material seized this morning, useful for reconstructing the full spread of the illicit activities carried out by these criminal associations and their contacts, including at an international level.
“Drug dealing represents a particularly serious crime not only for the effects it produces in itself on those who consume drugs, but also for the context in which it finds fertile ground for its diffusion and for the criminal activities it generates, in terms of degradation, petty crime and consequences on public order and safety – underlined Commissioner Sartori –. For this reason, prevention and combating its spread represents one of the priorities for the Police Forces, committed daily to guaranteeing the safety of citizens. The long and complex investigation concluded today has allowed the State Police to definitively dismantle criminal groups that in recent years had divided up the drug dealing areas in our city”.
press release – source: https://questure.poliziadistato.it/it/Bolzano/article/1803664f531629ac2859974212
