The National Police has arrested 25 people, including four officials—one from the SEPE and three from the Community of Madrid—and four employees of banking entities, for allegedly defrauding Social Security of more than four million euros with the capitalization of benefits. of unemployment.
The network, dismantled in Madrid last week, processed more than 400 illicit files between 2020 and 2024 addressed to the State Public Employment Service (SEPE), the General Directorate of the Police has reported.
According to the investigators' calculation, of the four million defrauded, the members of the organization would have received between one million and 1.5 million euros of benefit.
The so-called Seos operation began in December 2022 after agents discovered irregularities in the activity of various workers dedicated to processing unemployment benefits, who unjustifiably accessed certain unemployment benefit capitalization files.
This, remembers the Police, is a measure that allows recipients of the aid to use it to cover the necessary expenses to become self-employed.
As the investigations advanced, the agents discovered a network organized into five links and which included officials from public employment services, bank employees and administrative managers, among others.
Two men headed the plot and captured and contacted the clients, whom they directed to an agency in the Madrid district of Latina, where they formalized the necessary documents to request aid, mainly to acquire vehicles or computer equipment that should be used to work for themselves. own account.
The managers and workers of this company were in charge of this, who accredited these purchases with false invoices, acting in collusion with two other men, one dedicated to administrative traffic management and the other the manager of a dealership.
Another of the relevant links within the organization was that of public officials, one of them from SEPE and three from the General Directorate of the Public Employment Service of the Community of Madrid.
They used their credentials to access the SEPE databases and make daily queries about the files of the scheme and its beneficiaries.
In this way, the Police emphasize, they controlled the beginning procedures until the moment of payment of the aid and, in exchange, they received up to 50,000 euros per month from the leaders of the organization.
In another link were the employees of the banking entities, who opened the accounts in which the beneficiaries received the illicit benefits and ensured that the network received the agreed amounts through balance withholdings or deferred payment orders.
The investigators completed the operation with the search of 16 homes, in which computer equipment, mobile devices, high-end watches, more than 25,000 euros in cash, four vehicles and abundant documentation were seized.
The 25 detainees were placed at the disposal of the judicial authority as alleged perpetrators of crimes against Social Security, document falsification, bribery, revelation of secrets, money laundering and integration into a criminal organization.
