The Mossos d'Esquadra have dismantled a criminal group made up of nine people who had swindled more than two million euros over the last five years by posing as heirs of current account holders of deceased people.
Sub-inspector José Angel Merino, head of the Economic Crimes Area, announced the details at a press conference this Tuesday at the Egara Complex in Sabadell (Barcelona).
The criminal plot was made up of an employee of a bank branch in Barcelona, a forger and seven people who acted as false heirs who defrauded eight people.
The arrests took place on November 29 in Rubí, Terrassa, Sabadell and Barcelona, and, in addition, the Mossos searched homes in Rubí and Sabadell.
The detainees were handed over to the investigating court on duty in Barcelona on December 1, accused of the crimes of fraud, document falsification, money laundering and membership in a criminal group.
The actions of this group had a common denominator: the main participants recruited third parties posing as the heirs of deceased current account holders and had created an instrumental company to manage properties acquired with the money stolen by the false heirs.
It so happens that one of the leaders of the group worked in a financial institution and was in charge of providing personal information about clients to the person in charge of falsifying the documents.
The investigation began at the end of September when the Mossos became aware, through a banking entity, of the existence of a group of organized people who, over several years, had appropriated various bank deposits from clients by processing fraud files. fraudulent wills.
An error had allowed the bank to detect what happened when an 82-year-old woman, with an account in which there were not many transactions, showed up at its bank office to request a duplicate of her bank book.
When the employee entered his ID into the computer system, he realized that the woman had been listed as deceased for more than four years.
Subsequently, the financial entity detected new operations that it brought to the attention of the Mossos and the Laundering and Economic Crimes Unit was able to identify up to eight suspicious inheritance operations with a very similar pattern.
The police were able to link the false heirs to the two main leaders of the criminal group.
The detainees had generated a significant asset of 1.4 million euros and enjoyed high-end vehicles, some of 120,000 euros, properties in Sort, Masella and Llívia and luxury objects of great value that they managed through the company they had created.
Sub-inspector José Angel Merino has explained that the people they recruited to pose as heirs charged between 4,000 and 5,000 euros to act as an intermediary, while the two executors of the operation received large amounts of money.
The Mossos keep the investigation open and do not rule out new arrests.
