Spain: 30 arrested in probe into €17 million VAT fraud involving luxury cars

In a probe led by the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) in Madrid (Spain), law enforcement authorities have dismantled a transnational criminal network involved in the sale of luxury cars while evading VAT. The estimated damage in Spain alone amounts to €17 million. 

Thirty individuals were arrested, including the suspected ringleader. Law enforcement agents seized 34 properties, worth around €11 million, 20 luxury cars, jewellery and high-end watches, as well as over €300 000 in cash. At least 200 bank accounts have also been blocked in Germany, Lithuania, Portugal and Spain. 

These are the preliminary results of 17 searches carried out in Spain and Germany on 18 and 19 December 2024, at the homes of the suspects and at the premises of car dealerships under investigation. 

The suspected ringleader of the criminal organisation, who had been successfully evading arrest in a separate investigation, was eventually arrested in Germany in the EPPO investigation and awaits for his surrender to Spain. The individual in question is also the subject of 18 court orders in Spain relating to various cases of drug trafficking and tax fraud.

According to the investigation, the leader of the criminal organisation operated from Germany, from where he sent instructions to supply vehicles to car dealers located in Spain. The vehicles were distributed from Germany through two branches of the organisation, which were in charge of transporting and delivering the cars to dealerships located in the regions of Levante and Córdoba-Costa del Sol, in Spain. 

A third of the organisation is believed to have been responsible for weaving the complex web needed to perpetrate the tax fraud and launder the resulting proceeds, including “missing traders” or shell companiebranch s established for the sole purpose of evading the payment of VAT.

Based on the evidence, the criminal organisation used vulnerable people as ‘straw-men’ for the shell companies, in exchange for accommodation in houses that belonged to the suspects. 

The investigation and the searches counted on the support of the Spanish National Police’s unit specialised in economic and tax crime (Unidad de Delincuencia Económica y Fiscal de la Policía Nacional – UDEF), the Spanish Tax Agency (Agencia Tributaria) and the German authorities. 

All persons involved are presumed innocent until proven guilty by the competent Spanish courts of law.

The EPPO is the independent public prosecution office of the European Union. It is responsible for investigating, prosecuting and bringing to judgment crimes against the financial interests of the EU.

 

More information EPPO