The gold and 1100 billion centimes scandal before the judiciary on October 2nd

More than 50 defendants will appear before the Economic and Financial Penal Pole Court in Sidi M’hamed in Algiers on October 2, who are being prosecuted in the case of gold smuggling, tax fraud and money laundering within the framework of an organized criminal group.
The trial will be held at the third pole of the Economic and Financial Penal Pole, after the Indictment Chamber of the Algiers Judicial Council decided, on September 10, to uphold the decision of the investigating judge of the sixth chamber of the Economic and Financial Penal Pole to classify the facts on the basis of a “misdemeanor” and rejected the requests of the public prosecutor who requested to classify the facts on the basis of a “felony”.
The defendants in the current case are being prosecuted for corruption related to gold smuggling, tax fraud and money laundering, within the framework of an organized criminal group, forgery and the use of forged documents, and the practice of fraudulent commercial activities and violations of the exchange law.
On May 17, 2023, the Economic and Financial Pole Court confirmed that the case came as a result of a report regarding the practice of fraudulent commercial activities harmful to the national economy through the illegal trade in precious metals and fraudulent tax evasion maneuvers, so that a preliminary investigation was opened into these facts through which cash deposits of very significant amounts of money were discovered and their source was disguised through complex bank transfers, with the complicity of public employees to justify the fictitious payment of fictitious sales invoices related to fictitious commercial activities.
In early May 2023, the National Security Services were able to bring down a criminal network consisting of 25 people, specializing in the illegal trade in gold, with the recovery of seized items and funds worth more than 330 billion centimes.
The operation was carried out thanks to the effective exploitation of information received in this regard and the development of a systematic operational plan that allowed the seizure and recovery of seized items, consisting of “a quantity of gold exceeding 135 kg and another exceeding 180 kg of silver, including 140 kg of raw material, in addition to the recovery of 5 billion Algerian centimes and 32 thousand euros, with the freezing of bank accounts estimated at more than 135 billion centimes.”
The in-depth investigations, supported by procedures to extend the jurisdiction, accompanied by a search warrant for the company’s headquarters and the residences of the suspects, led to the identification of the members of the network who come from the states of Batna, Constantine, Biskra and the capital.
Accordingly, it was found that “the main accused, aged 59, residing in Ben Aknoun district, in upper Algiers, resorted to importing gold from abroad using the commercial register of the company he manages, taking advantage of the facilities provided by the exchange law in purchasing hard currency at the bank rate.”
According to investigations by the National Security Services, the accused resorts to “selling the imported gold on the black market to deposit the financial proceeds into his own bank account, using commercial records extracted in the name of the network members for fictitious activities that do not exist in reality and with the complicity of employees of a national bank.” Investigators also discovered “the huge volume of transactions and financial movements recorded in the bank account of the main mastermind, which exceeded 1,100 billion centimes.”