So far they had managed to print 50 euro banknotes with a total value of 48 million euros, all completely fake. The Naples financial police discovered the clandestine printing plant inside a warehouse in the Ponticelli district, where the gang of counterfeiters actually lived and worked, carrying out extremely tight shifts. Seven people were stopped by the Naples financiers, who carried out the raid at dawn today together with colleagues from the Special Currency Police Unit of Rome. According to investigators, these are members of the so-called “Napoli Group”, an organization of counterfeiters already at the center of several investigations.
When the soldiers broke into the warehouse, inside they found two counterfeiters sleeping in beds. The two would have lived in substantial isolation since April to carry out the work until obtaining the quantity of counterfeit banknotes seized. The financiers found 80 thousand sheets of paper, each with 12 50 euro notes just waiting to be cut. The activity was carried out with offset printing machines, more capable than those with digital technology of producing copies extremely similar to real banknotes. The two counterfeiters who lived locked up in the shed had practically never gone out for a month. A sutler took care of their needs and brought them food and drink. The activity was coordinated by a 70-year-old printer with numerous criminal records. He was the one who managed the production, also with the help of three truck drivers from Giugliano in Campania.
The printing press had only recently been moved to the Ponticelli district. Previously it was located in the province of Naples, in Casavatore. But only in the warehouse in the city, the activity would have entered into full swing, thanks to the use of particularly bulky machinery, which needed the spaces provided by the warehouse. The structure belongs to an environmental reclamation company, which however is not involved in the investigations.
Photo 222057349 | 50 Euros © Maksym Kapliuk | Dreamstime.com
