Russian mafia money-laundering ring broke in Spain

Fourteen people have been arrested in a range of raids targeting criminal, money-laundering network in Spain and Portugal, working with gangs across Europe.

According to the European Union Law Enforcement Agency Europeol, most of the suspected Russian citizens detained last month are.

According to Spain’s National Police, the ring charged a 2-3% commission fee for transfer of the amount of illegal drug smuggling mainly as part of the “a real multinational money laundering company”.

Nine properties were raided across Spain, as well as Portuguese capital lisbons, and more than € 1M in cash and cryptocurrency.

The gang operated with each office processing in Spain cities, which is € 300,000 per day for Albanian, Serbian, Armenian, Chinese, Ukrainian and Colombian mafia located in the European Union and other places.

The investigation began in 2023 when police noticed that many known members of the Russian mafia were systematically transferring money related to foreign nationals outside and outside Spain on a daily basis.

Europeol said the scheme used the “hawala” method that consists of customers at a place reaching a broker who then contacts a colleague at another place who transfer the desired amount to the recipient.

This allowed gangs to transfer money to countries without transferring it physically or digitally between bank accounts.

The gang also focused on expanding its business in Cuba with the aim of setting up solar panels to provide energy to the Cuba government in exchange for minerals.

During the phone-call with Cuba officials, gang members claimed to have close links with Spanish political leaders.

Each of the properties published in Madrid, Malaga, Marbela, Torremolinos, Coin, Ayamonte and Lisbon had a high-safety safe and a money-coating machine stored in a sound-proof cabinet, used to use identified noise to money counters. Was done to obscure.

The gang members refrained from regularly replacing location and vehicles and using encrypted mobile phones.

The phone was added in such a way that a member of the group should be arrested, the entire ring’s mobile phone would be closed simultaneously.

Police say the three Ringalders are in custody and say other arrests are possible.