First the annulled seizure, now the full acquittal. The legal case of a couple of entrepreneurs, husband and wife, comes to an end. The sentence was pronounced by the Barcelona court which acquitted Anna Siragusa and Domenico Cattafi, entrepreneurs in the logistics and transport sector and owners of Ags Logistic, based in Germany, and of Cattafi Transervice based in Milazzo, him. In 2022 the investigating judge of the Barcelona court had ordered a preventive seizure for an equivalent amount for a total value of approximately 3 million euros. The seizure was annulled by the Review Court which accepted the appeal of the defenders, lawyers Nicola Verderico and Roberto Picciolo. The proceedings continued and the two entrepreneurs were sent to trial. The businesswoman, as sole director of a company under German law considered by investigators to be fiscally “foreign-invested” and therefore subject to tax obligations in Italy, was accused of failing to declare for not having submitted the VAT return from 2016 to 2020 with a total evasion of over 1.4 million euros. According to the accusation, the company, with registered office in Germany, actually constituted a hidden permanent organization in Italy and therefore should have fulfilled the declaration obligations of the national territory. The husband, instead of also providing transport services to his wife’s company, was charged with the crime of unfaithful declaration as he had invoiced Acs Logistic by applying the reverse charge regime, considering the company a community customer. The financial administration, qualifying it as an Italian entity, considered this regime to be incorrect, contesting VAT evasion of more than 1.5 million euros.
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