Operation “Game Over” completed. The main suspect is the owner of a slot room in Manzano, which he purchased and managed through a nominee
UDINE. The financiers of the Provincial Command of Udine have completed the “Game Over” operation against 11 suspects of Chinese nationality responsible for various reasons of money laundering, self-laundering, illegal financial activity and other tax crimes, against which the Authority Judicial Court of Udine ordered the preventive seizure for an amount of over 2 million euros, allowing, during the execution phase, to place the precautionary constraint on assets and financial resources worth 650 thousand euros.
The main suspect is the owner of a slot room in Manzano, which he purchased and managed through a nominee.
The survey takes its cue from a preventive monitoring of the slot rooms in the Friuli area, in order to intercept possible illegal phenomena and the reuse of money carried out through gaming.
In particular, numerous reports of suspicious money laundering financial transactions forwarded by the Financial Intelligence Unit of the Bank of Italy to the Special Currency Police Unit of the Guardia di Finanza were examined.
From the beginning, attention was paid to a Chinese citizen, owner of a slot room, already known to the soldiers of the Compagnia di Cividale del Friuli, as the de facto administrator of many upholstery workshops in the Manzanese area.
These laboratories were subject to specific tax audits by which the respective taxes evaded following the failure to comply with the prescribed accounting, declarative and tax payment obligations were quantified, for a total taxable amount of over 2 million euros.
The illicit proceeds realized through evasion were subsequently reused by the suspect in economic and financial activities both in Italy and abroad and, in particular, also in the purchase of a license for the exercise of the gaming collection activity and of bets.
The investigations, coordinated by the Udine Public Prosecutor’s Office, were developed by analyzing the bank transactions carried out by the slot room in favor of numerous people of Chinese origin. Afterwards, the financiers of Cividale del Friuli, with the support of the Central Organized Crime Investigation Service (Scico), followed live the activities carried out inside the slot room, through the installation of hidden video cameras. In this way, repeated deliveries of cash were identified, even for significant amounts, not related to the formally authorized gaming activity.
Therefore, the criminal origin of these sums of money emerged, all of which can be linked to compatriots of the owner of the slot room, in turn owners of companies operating in the province of Udine, in the wood and furniture sectors, and responsible for tax crimes. , who used gambling activities to conceal the illicit origin of the money. In this way, 11 episodes of money laundering and self-laundering were identified, for a total value of approximately 125 thousand euros.
At the same time, the owner of the slot room carried out an illegal financial intermediation activity, in the absence of the required authorizations, collecting money and granting loans for around 42 thousand euros.
The intervention carried out by the Guardia di Finanza is the result of a targeted intensification activity aimed at intercepting and repressing any attempt to pollute the legal economy and contrast the most insidious forms of money laundering.