Millions of VAT fraud, fraudulent loans and money laundering. 60 heard the indictment

An indictment was submitted to the District Court in Kalisz regarding, among others, falsifying invoices for a total of PLN 25 million. The suspect faces at least five years in prison.

As Maciej Meler, spokesman for the District Prosecutor's Office in Ostrów Wlkp., told PAP on Wednesday, the case concerns a 60-year-old resident of the Poznań district. He conducted criminal activities at the turn of 2016/2017 in Ostrów County (Greater Poland Voivodeship).

During this time, acting in an organized criminal group, he issued over a thousand false invoices for a total of nearly PLN 25 million. The invoices were supposed to be evidence of the alleged purchase of MDF boards by a company from Ostrów in Lithuania.

In this way – according to the spokesman of the prosecutor's office – the suspect led the State Treasury to reduce VAT by PLN 4.6 million.

The man was also accused of extorting loans from several banks with a total amount of over PLN 1.2 million and money laundering in the total amount of approximately PLN 15 million.

The man faces 5 to 25 years in prison.

The proceedings against the remaining members of the criminal group have not yet been completed.

– The case is very extensive. The 60-year-old's indictment is over 500 pages long, said prosecutor Meler.

He explained that for the sake of the investigation, no other details of the case are being disclosed. He also added that the company from Ostrów involved in the criminal activity had to return over PLN 3 million to the State Treasury for unduly collected VAT.

Ewa Bąkowska (PAP)

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