Galery

1

After several months of investigation the Human trafficking control department part of the Organized Crime control office in Attica busted a gang dealing with human trafficking, which for 10 years has been making a fortune through sexual exploitation of girls from Eastern Europe and the Balkans.

The profit of the bosses of the criminal group, a 51-year-old man and a 61-year old woman, both Greek citizens, amounted to 1,000 euros per day, adding also to them the salaries of their "employees" and the small amounts of money which they gave the girls to liveon.

Through simultaneous raids in the homes and places they used, the police arrested the whole gang of pimps which includes 15 people; the police are still searching for the 61-year-old boss.

According to a police communication, the criminal gang members discovered the women through "employment agencies" and taking advantage of their vulnerable financial and social situation they were bringing them to Greece with the promise that they would take them abroad to work as waitresses.

Subsequently, after supplying them with false travel documents issued by Member States of the European Union, they forced them into prostitution in hotels and homes throughout the Attica region, through ads published in various newspapers.

To arrange the meetings they used three telephone exchanges in various homes in Nea Philadelphia and Agii Anagiri, which were rented for this purpose as well as 65 mobile phones that were confiscated during the police operation.

Pimps accompanied the women to the meeting place, and then took the money they earned, giving them a small part. They then took out their remuneration and the rest of the money they gave every day to the treasurer of the group, a 38-year-old Greek. As soon as the latter collected the daily profit, he submitted it to the two bosses of the criminal group who deposited it into their own bank accounts or sent it abroad.

During the search of the houses, police found thousands of notes (manually completed forms) with the girls’ everyday meetings with clients, the names of members of the group of the women they used and the amounts they collected. In electronic format (optical CD) they also found the group’s list of clients containing the personal data of customers, who were over 6500 people. The information in the database was arranged by month in the form of an archive.

During the search of the homes of gang members, the following were found and confiscated: 14,015 euros, 12 cars used to transport the women, fake travel documents and small quantities of drugs.

During the police raid 6 women were taken to the Human trafficking control department, who are foreign citizens working in the "office". One of them, with Russian citizenship, requested assistance and protection, and is currently in the shelter of a non-governmental organization while an application for qualifying her as a victim of human trafficking will be submitted to the prosecution’s office.

The 15 people arrested yesterday faced the District Attorney of Athens.

Charges were brought against them for their involvement in a criminal group, human trafficking, legalization of profits earned through criminal activities, funding terrorist activities, as well as violations of the law on protection of personal data, the law on tax evasion control, the law on drugs, foreign citizens, etc.