The National Police has dismantled a criminal organization dedicated to labor exploitation through a fictitious company that had more than 185 workers in an irregular situation, 100 of them simultaneously, throughout its more than two years of existence. . The researchers point out that the company, which offered care services to dependent people, domestic workers and cleaning services, is the company with the largest number of employees in this situation detected in the history of the Balearic Islands.
Within the framework of this operation, the agents have arrested five people as alleged perpetrators of crimes of belonging to a criminal organization, favoring irregular immigration, against the rights of workers, against the rights of foreign citizens and falsehood. documentary. Group I of UCRIF of the BPEF (Provincial Immigration and Border Brigade) of the Balearic National Police Headquarters has carried out the operational phase of an investigation that began last July.
Investigators have also obtained evidence of a possible crime of money laundering by the leader of the organization and two other members of the organization, who are accused of a crime of professional intrusion by posing as physiotherapists, carrying out rehabilitation sessions. to elderly people without having the corresponding training qualification and with serious risk to the health of the elderly.
According to the investigations, the criminal organization had created a fictitious company to which they had given an image of legitimacy with all types of brochures and advertising of the company, tables of services and costs. To such an extent they had managed to offer this impression that it was recommended by social workers from city councils and public hospitals on the island, thus managing to deceive the officials of these organizations.
Using the fictitious company, the detainees offered care services to dependent people, domestic workers or cleaning services. The jobs were carried out by foreign citizens in an irregular situation, mostly women, who due to their vulnerable situation lent themselves to carrying out work in exploitative conditions.
The vast majority were hired as interns and worked more than six days a week, without respecting rest periods, without any type of health coverage or accident insurance, without the right to vacations and in exchange for a much lower salary in the case of the internal ones, having only two consecutive hours a day for personal rest.
The main investigator demonstrated such contempt for the rights of the workers that he processed health insurance for them in a well-known insurance company that issued them their corresponding health card, managing to deceive both the workers and the contractors of the services, although in reality he did not. paid the fees and the workers did not obtain such coverage. One of the workers suffered a work accident, breaking a bone in her foot, and when she went to the emergency room, the hospital informed her that her health insurance was not valid in any way since the owner of the company had not paid the contributions.
The operation has been developed in two phases, beginning with the detection of a crime of document falsification when one of the women hired by the criminal organization presented a false registration certificate at the General Social Security Treasury, specifically at the Foreigners’ Office. for the processing of the Residence Permit.
In a second phase, the agents managed to identify the main person responsible at the head of the organization as well as several people controlled by him who collaborated in the criminal plot, recruiting and controlling the workers and carrying out the administrative management of the company.
The extensive investigation carried out over several months has allowed for the intervention of a large amount of documentation that reinforces the evidence collected and confirms the modus operandi of the criminal organization, which carried out false hiring and fictitious employment contracts that have even been used to open bank accounts and administrative procedures by the victims themselves, who in many cases were unaware of their illicit nature.
Foreign bank accounts
The main investigator had a total of 25 bank accounts in 13 different banks in his name, also using currency transfer entities to move money and pay his employees. The detainee went so far as to open bank accounts with headquarters in a European capital with the aim of evading the action of justice as well as the Tax Agency in relation to the payment of taxes.
The organization also used a call center in Palma to open these bank accounts and forced practically all of the workers to open a bank account there so as not to be detected by the authorities.
On November 20, two home searches were carried out together with the judicial authority in which a large amount of documentation from the fictitious company was seized, as well as computer equipment and mobile terminals that are being investigated by the National Police.
In the absence of analysis of the documentation received from the banking entities, the currency transfer services and the effects intervened in the home records, the agents have been able to verify that the organization earned approximately 200,000 euros per month, taking into account that said organization would be acting for approximately two and a half years, which would have generated around six million euros. UCRIF Group I continues the investigation and does not rule out new arrests.
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