Assets worth 10 million euros were seized by the Financial Police from three Reggio entrepreneurs operating in the petroleum products trade sector and involved in the «Andrea Doria» trial, born from the Reggio branch of the «Petrolmafie» maxi-investigation.
The provision, ordered by the Prevention Measures section of the Court at the request of the DDA of Reggio Calabria, was carried out by the financiers of the Provincial Command and the Scico against the brothers Giovanni and Domenico Camastrafrom Locri, aged 60 and 53 respectively, and from Antonio Casile, 55 years old, from Reggio Calabria. The seizure was carried out in Calabria, Piedmont, Lazio and Munich. All three are currently on trial.
In April 2021 they were, in fact, arrested in the blitz organized by the prosecutor Giovanni Bombardieri and the deputy Giuseppe Lombardo who, following investigations by the financial police, managed to reveal a complex system of tax fraud, carried out in the petroleum products, based, according to the accusation, on fictitious corporate triangulations, aimed at evading VAT and excise duties, as well as on the use of false declarations of intent, an institution that allows purchases under a tax-free regime.
The association would also have managed the entire distribution chain of the petroleum product from the tax warehouse to the final roadside distributors, interposing a series of economic operators – fuel trading “paper mill” companies, commercial depots and local brokers – with the aim of systematically evade taxes. The “paper mill” companies fraudulently claimed, according to the accusation, that they possessed all the requirements to benefit from the benefits provided by the legislation, purchasing the petroleum product without applying VAT. The product, thanks to mere “paper” transfers between the companies involved, was then sold at competitive prices to identified customers, to the detriment of honest entrepreneurs. In the end, the system of cleaning up the takings would also take place through ‘ndrangheta families stakeholders in the petroleum product distribution sector.
After verifying that the value of the assets owned by the three entrepreneurs was disproportionate to their earning capacity, the financiers arranged the seals to a company operating in the trade of petroleum products, to 7 buildings located in the provinces of Frosinone, Rome and Novara, and to financial positions in Germany. Last year the DDA seized other assets worth 80 million euros from the same entrepreneurs.