A case of impersonation of agricultural equipment and construction companies. Five people, including four Beninese nationals, were sent to trial, accused of fraud against some forty victims, we learned on Friday.
The suspects, including the French companion of one of the Beninese, were arrested in the Paris region, in central and southern France, after a year and a half of investigation by the research section of the gendarmerie of Lille, detailed a military source, confirming information from The voice of the North.
fictional material
Prosecuted for organized fraud and money laundering, the suspects were brought to the Dunkirk prosecutor’s office on Thursday. They were placed under judicial supervision, with a bond of 1,000 to 5,000 euros, including a ban on leaving the territory and issuing checks, the prosecutor told AFP.
They would have usurped the digital identity of four companies that do not have a website, to trick customers by offering them to buy fictitious equipment, according to the source within the gendarmerie.
Damage estimated at 520,000 euros
About forty victims, natural and legal persons, have been identified, in France, Europe and as far as the United States. The “raised and estimated” damage is 520,000 euros, but the gains of the network, whose “brain would be in Benin”, “probably were much higher”, specified the prosecution.
The gendarmerie was put on the track in Wormhout, in the North, after a customer had claimed from one of the contractors targeted the tractor he believed to have bought. The investigators “succeeded in overcoming all the screens” put in place by the sector to prevent the tracing of the flow of money, we welcomed the gendarmerie.