Two police officers were charged in Belgium in an investigation into drug trafficking after a raid on Tuesday which led to the arrest of 22 people, the Brussels prosecutor’s office announced on Thursday. During the 45 searches carried out on Tuesday in the Antwerp and Brussels sectors, three police officers were arrested.
Among them, one was “relaxed after his interview by the police”. The other two were presented to an investigating judge “who charged them with participation in a criminal organization,” continues the prosecution, specifying that both were released – one under conditions.
350 members of the police mobilized
Nine other accused suspects were placed in preventive detention. The charges relate to “the count of participation in a criminal organization and sale, import and export of narcotics (cannabis and cocaine), in association”, adds the press release.
The federal police indicated on Tuesday that they had seized “money, luxury vehicles and a handgun” during the operation which mobilized some 350 members of the police, including special units.
The investigation, which began in February 2023 “following several serious crimes” linked to the drug world, “was able to demonstrate the existence of drug trafficking at several levels, from local deals to import/export , and to suspect the involvement of certain individuals in settling scores using firearms,” the police said.
Decrypted messaging
Investigators managed to decrypt several phones using Sky ECC, messaging popular with criminals whose decryption has enabled several raids against drug traffickers since 2021.
A mega-trial began in December in Brussels, where more than 120 defendants involved in international cocaine and cannabis trafficking appeared, confused in large part thanks to decryptions of this type of messaging.
Seizures of cocaine in the Belgian port of Antwerp, the first gateway into Europe for this drug shipped from Latin America, amounted to some 116 tonnes in 2023, which constitutes a new record.