Fuel, Guardia di Finanza uncovers maxi-fraud on excise duties in Catania: EUR 235,000 seized
Diesel imported from Eastern European countries with false documents to obtain tax exemption. Procurement of agricultural diesel for other commercial activities with discounts on VAT and excise duties also contested
by Marco Mobili and Giovanni Parente
There is not only speculation. On fuels, the level of attention remains high, indeed very high, on the frauds that are being deployed to circumvent the payment of excise duties. Just as price rises on prices of petrol and diesel are one of the main problems facing families and businesses, the Guardia di Finanza uncovered a fraudulent scheme that led to a maxi-sequestration for a total value of EUR 250,000.
Fraudulent Misappropriation
The investigation was coordinated by the Catania Public Prosecutor's Office. The Etna provincial command of the Fiamme Gialle executed in the provinces of Catania, Siracusa, Enna, Cesena, and Rome, with the support of the first metropolitan operational nucleus of the Capital and the Cesena Group, two orders of the Judge for Preliminary Investigations at the Court concerning seven suspects. The personal precautionary measures were taken against a businessman and his four accomplices for fraudulent evasion of payment of excise duties on energy products.
The double offence system
These are the two illicit schemes that were ascertained in the course of the investigation. On the one hand, the entrepreneur, de facto director of six companies in the transport sector, supplied himself with diesel (400,000 litres in total) from Eastern European refineries, which he had transported to Italy by tyres or rail, using documents that falsely certified the transport of tax-free bio anticorrosive liquid. On the other hand, the same entrepreneur procured subsidised diesel for agricultural use, with which he supplied his company vehicles, thereby saving a considerable amount of tax. Gasoil for agriculture, in fact, is taxed at a reduced rate compared to the ordinary rate for road transport, both with regard to VAT (10 per cent instead of 22 per cent) and excise duties (approximately 50 cents less per litre). To give an appearance of legality to the operation, the sale of the product was formally invoiced to an agricultural cooperative.
The Budget
As a result, movable assets and cash worth 235,000 euro, 143,000 litres of energy products, an illegal warehouse, seven tank containers, tractors, semi-trailers and 58 tankers were seized.
