BERLIN (AP) — Police detained suspects and searched several properties in Germany and Italy Wednesday morning in a major operation targeting a branch of the ‘ndrangheta, an Italian criminal organization.
In Germany, more than 1,000 agents searched dozens of homes, offices and businesses in the states of Bavaria, North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate, according to a statement from the prosecutor’s office.
In Italy, agents of the carabinieri with the support of helicopters executed arrest warrants against 108 people accused, among other crimes, of mafia association, money laundering and possession, production and trafficking of arms and drugs.
Some 30 suspects with outstanding warrants have been arrested in Germany.
Among other things, the defendants are charged with money laundering, organized tax evasion, organized business fraud and drug smuggling, said a statement from the state criminal investigation office in North Rhine-Westphalia.
The raids were part of a larger joint investigation with Europol and included simultaneous operations in other European countries, the statement said.
Arrests were made in Belgium, France, Portugal, Romania and Spain, according to a press release from the carabinieri in Reggio Calabria, the area where the ‘ndrangheta is based.
Press conferences were scheduled for later Wednesday in Italy and Germany.
The operation in Germany focused on North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate, with some 500 agents deployed in each of those two states.
In North Rhine-Westphalia, 51 houses, apartments, offices and company premises were searched, and there were 15 detainees.
In Rhineland-Palatinate, the police searched 50 buildings and arrested 10 suspects. The teams in that state were supported by special units of the federal government and other states, as well as staff from customs and the tax investigation department, according to the German news agency dpa.
Rhineland-Palatinate Interior Minister Michael Ebling described the operations as an “effective strike” against organized crime.
“Today he sends a very clear message: there is no place for organized crime in Europe and there is certainly no place for it here with us in Rhineland-Palatinate,” he said, in statements collected by dpa.
