After the arrest Tuesday evening in Toulouse of two Venezuelans, a woman and a man, who were carrying more than 2 million euros in cash, the investigation continues under the authority of a Bordeaux investigating judge of the jurisdiction specialized interregional. In police custody, the two suspects encountered curious memory lapses.
There was talk of traveling to Northern Europe, of being of service, and of much, much ignorance… Arrested by the police officers of the Right Bank anti-crime brigade on Tuesday evening at the Toulouse bus station, a woman and a man were to join Barcelona. This Friday, June 2, they discover Bordeaux, more precisely its courthouse and the underground, secure services of the Jirs, the specialized interregional jurisdiction.
This jurisdiction deals with the high spheres of banditry, often with ramifications beyond the French borders. These magistrates have many questions to ask about the €2,116,000 discovered in two suitcases. Not really small savings that you carry around on vacation. A pleasure trip? However, this is one of the ideas put forward by the 24-year-old young woman arrested on Tuesday with her 36-year-old travel companion.
7 hours to count tickets
This pretty Venezuelan says she is a student, specializing in law and “living” in Barcelona with “odd jobs”. However, the investigators of the territorial direction of the judicial police of Toulouse, who spent very long hours counting, and recounting, the tickets (7 hours!), Had time to discover some anomalies or curiosities.
Already this 36-year-old man and woman present themselves as cousins. But they admit to having carnal relations. Nothing forbids it. But why, they who say they live penniless, offered themselves two plane tickets to Amsterdam without planning the return, forgetting in passing the great savings?
The investigators discovered photos and videos in their telephone suggesting a very light one-way trip and the purchase, along the canals of the capital of the Netherlands, of two large suitcases. Where were they filled? By who ? When the young woman swears to ignore everything, her friend talks about an operation in a hotel room in the presence of Madame. To whom should this sum of money be delivered? The question of course remains unanswered.
For the moment.
2.1 million or 600 kg of cocaine
In October 2018, customs officers seized 653 kg of cocaine during a simple check at a motorway rest area, southeast of Toulouse. This merchandise transported by two Finns traveled in a truck full of fish. After this capture, the investigators of the Toulouse judicial police, with the help of other European police, managed to identify a team which multiplied the round trips between southern Europe and northern Europe. Its members are said to be responsible for importing several hundred kilos of drugs. The investigation, conducted in Bordeaux by the Jirs, is coming to an end and the judgment should take place in the coming months.
With the 2.1 million transported, the two Venezuelans could have financed around 600 kg of cocaine, wholesale price. Was this money to be used to buy or did it come to pay for a shipment already delivered? Or something else ? Are the two suspects simple lamplighters or more involved than they want to admit? The man would have made several trips to South America in recent weeks. Surely family business…
Presented this Friday afternoon to the prosecutor’s office of the Jirs which opened a judicial investigation, they must be indicted in particular for “laundering”. Their incarceration, at the end of the day, is probable.
