Lecce. Operation "skipper" 23 precautionary measures for drug trafficking

After an intense investigation activity, which lasted over 2 years, coordinated by the District Anti-Mafia Directorate of the Public Prosecutor's Office at the Court of Lecce, today 2 February 2021, the agents of the State Police, on duty at the Mobile Squad of the Lecce Police Headquarters have carried out 23 precautionary coercive measures of freedom, together with the Anti-Mafia Investigation Department concerned for all the activity of a patrimonial nature with preventive seizures for a total value of over 4.000.000,00 euros

Judicial police activities are currently underway concerning the execution of the remaining 3 measures of the 26 planned.

The operation called "Skipper", carried out by the Flying Squad, highlighted a huge and consolidated transactional drug trafficking carried out by a local criminal organization with the characteristics of the associative bond in whose illicit activity, for various reasons, a considerable number of subjects, mostly residing in the lower Salento.

The investigations, which lasted for about two years, through the use of environmental and telephone wiretapping, acquisition of printouts, localization devices and GPS and also observation, control and stalking activities, allowed to detect, despite the skilful attempts to evade controls of suspects, the existence of a consolidated and widespread local criminal network permanently dedicated to the transactional trade in cocaine. Following the findings that emerged from the captive activity, in the course of the investigations, five arrests in the act of crime were also carried out as well as the seizure of about 25 kg of cocaine, various weapons and about 90.000,00 euros in cash found in the possession of the suspects .

The constant monitoring carried out by the men of the Flying Squad therefore made it possible to identify the prominent personalities of the criminal organization, the methods of communication adopted, the means used, the procedure for importing the substance and the precise roles covered by each participant.

He could fully ascertain how the association had numerous means of transport artfully modified for the main purpose of concealing the narcotic inside, by creating slips in the driver's cabin or in the area below the rear seats or the luggage compartment. The contacts between the associates took place rigorously through the use of an encrypted telephone and messaging system that was difficult and complex to decipher with the aim of evading police controls and useful to prevent the illegal activity from being directly attributable to them. There were numerous weapons in the availability of the criminal association, hidden inside buildings or real estate properties, as well as many were the buildings used as storage rooms for the drug present, as well as in the Dutch import site, also in the Salento area.

The organization presented a well-defined and tested organization chart:

  • a 59-year-old from Salento, as promoter, organizer, manager and financier, dedicated to the procurement of cocaine from Holland and to contacts with international suppliers; 
  • a 30-year-old from Acquarica del Capo, organizer, responsible for the direction of imports from Holland and the subsequent distribution of the narcotic in the Salento area;
  • a 53 year old from Taviano, participant, who, having acquired the substance from the GA, redistributed it on the main squares of the Lecce province;
  • a 32-year-old from Presicce, and a XNUMX-year-old from Taviano, dedicated to the transport, purchase and sale of cocaine in the territories of competence and the related operations of delivery and collection of payments in cash;
  • a 53-year-old from Campania, participant, employee of a trucking company based in Villa Literno (CE), whose vehicles were used for the transport and delivery of weapons and narcotics, who directly took care of the transport of the drug from Amsterdam to the place of Neapolitan storage, and from here, in the Salento area, also taking care of the transfer of money from the Lecce province to Holland.

Around the central structure then the criminal contribution of numerous and further subjects, also gravitating steadily around the consolidated and dedicated, in various ways, to the acquisition of the narcotic and the subsequent and final placing on the market.

The criminal structure, distinguished by the evident professionalism in the crime of each and all the partners, presented a meticulously prepared modus operandi: the narcotic, originally produced in South America, arrived in Holland, precisely in Amsterdam, the place where apartments for hoc for couriers, dozens of warehouses for the storage of the substance as well as various local garages for the custody of articulated vehicles and the means necessary for loading and transport. Huge quantities of cocaine were then periodically imported from Holland, under the supervision of the top figure, the fifty-nine-year-old, who, first taking care of the supplies of the drug by maintaining contacts with international suppliers and financing them, then directed the subsequent transports and deliveries in the Salento, carried out with systematic periodicity by his trusted men. The latter, using means of transport belonging to a Neapolitan company, where the fifty-three-year-old lent his work, acquired the narcotic of South American origin from Holland, made a stop at the Campania storage place and then provided to deliver it in the Salento.

On the other hand, the thirty-year-old who, once the imported substance arrived, managed, through some of his followers, the subsequent delivery to the other participants in the criminal association, as organizer of the distribution in the Salento area. The latter would then proceed with the sale of the drug in the main squares of Nardò, Ruffano, Scorrano, Acquarica del Capo, Lecce, Taviano, Taranto.

With the same application order of personal precautionary measure, for the results of the asset collection activities carried out by the men of the DIA, interested and coordinated by the District Anti-Mafia Directorate of Lecce during the investigations on the transnational drug trafficking, the preventive seizure was ordered by equivalent, aimed at confiscating the assets constituting proceeds and profits from the crime - mostly real estate properties located in the provinces of Lecce and Salerno and bank current accounts - for a value of over 4.000.000,00 euros, to charge of four of the investigated subjects. The execution of these preventive seizures by the Agents of the DIA took place at the same time as the arrest of the recipients of custody in prison.

In the same operational context in connection with the Dutch police, searches are being carried out in the city of Amsterdam, the operations concern warehouses located in the port area where the substance arriving from South America was stored before being sent to Italy, as well as houses located in the immediate suburban outskirts where couriers who came from Italy to load the substance to be transported stayed.

For the arrest of some of the associates, recipients of precautionary measures, located outside the Lecce province, we proceeded jointly to the Mobile Teams of Rome, Naples, Caserta, Brindisi and Taranto, competent for the territory.

The execution of at least three of the coercive measures issued instead required the internationalization of the restrictive measure of the AG and close collaboration with foreign police authorities, pending the presence in other states, in particular Germany and Brazil, of some of the suspects . The location and capture of the latter as well as all the various activities carried out in foreign territory, in fact took place thanks to the intelligence activity carried out in conjunction with the foreign branches of the Central Anti-Drug Directorate and the Central Criminal Police Directorate.

In the executive phases of the arrests, the collaboration of the staff of the Crime Prevention Departments of Lecce and Bari as well as effective anti-drug and anti-explosive canine units at the airport offices of Brindisi and Bari was used.

Lecce. Operation "skipper" 23 precautionary measures for drug trafficking

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