Border Guard officers and the Central Bureau of Investigation of the Police—with the supervision of the National Prosecutor’s Office and support from Europol—arrested another 8 members of the organized criminal group dismantled last November. “Its members transported foreigners from Romania through Poland to Western European countries. The foreigners paid between $6,500 and $20,000 for such a ‘journey,’” reports Maj. SG Joanna Konieczniak, spokesperson for the Nadodrze Border Guard Unit.
She adds:
For many months, officers of the Nadodrze Border Guard Unit from the Zgorzelec station and police officers from the Wrocław branch of the Central Bureau of Investigation of the Police have been conducting an investigation under the supervision of the Wrocław Branch of the National Prosecutor’s Office’s Department for Organized Crime and Corruption. The case concerns an organized criminal group arranging routes for transporting foreigners to Western Europe.
The first arrests in the case took place last November. Maj. SG J. Konieczniak: “On November 6, in the Lower Silesian, Lubusz, Greater Poland and Masovian voivodeships, 10 people were arrested, including 9 Poles and 1 Vietnamese citizen.
At the end of June, in the Masovian, Podlaskie, Lower Silesian and Lubusz voivodeships, officers arrested 8 more members of the criminal group: this time, 7 Poles and a Vietnamese citizen.
The criminal group operated from July 2018 to November 2019. Investigators estimated that during this period it managed to transport at least 150 foreigners to Western European countries. The officers said:
The group members had numerous locations in the Lubusz, Lower Silesian and Silesian voivodeships where foreigners were hidden before the next stage of transportation to their destination country. They also had vehicles specially prepared for this purpose, including refrigerated trucks with professional hiding places that made it possible to transport up to 6 people concealed inside. In addition, the group had specially constructed ovens with a feeder and control system, in which one foreigner was transported in concealment. The hiding place was equipped with a breathing mask and an oxygen cylinder.
During questioning, one of the defendants testified that he entered the oven hiding place and lasted in it for only an hour. The journey was supposed to take several dozen hours.
The case is developing, and further arrests cannot be ruled out, including in the European Union.
The spokesperson said:
There are currently 19 suspects in the investigation. In the case of 11 detained members of the organized group, the prosecutor of the Wrocław Branch of the National Prosecutor’s Office’s Department for Organized Crime and Corruption filed an indictment with the District Court in Wrocław, while 10 group members are being held in pretrial detention awaiting trial.
The suspects face between six months and eight years in prison.