The individuals involved according to Italian legislation had constituted a conspiracy finalized to counterfeiting and marketing fakes artworks within the context of transnational organized crime, as well as recycling money from the sale of fake artworks.
The modus operandi was based on:
- counterfeiting, reproduction and marketing of artworks falsely attributed to modern and contemporary masters (Mirò, Lichtenstein, Picasso, Dalì, Chagall, Tapies, Chillida);
- use of technical equipment for reproduction and counterfeiting of artworks and related expertises;
- fraud to the detriment of unsuspecting buyers, through sale of counterfeited artworks by using fake expertises;
- managing of bank accounts opened with credit institutions in Barcelona, San Francisco and Chicago, flowed with periodical transfer accounts by accomplished galleries
The group could count on an organized network of skilled forgers and dealers on counterfeited artworks.
The investigative activities were developed in 2007/2008 in North Italy, in co-operation with FBI and Barcelona’s Mossos d’Esquadra, under the direction of Antimafia District Directorate in Milan, in full cooperation with Eurojust and the respective foreign Judiciary authorities. The operation allowed the dismantling of a criminal association network, composed by traffickers, middlemen, national and international art dealers, for various reasons involved in:
- counterfeiting, reproduction and marketing of artworks falsely attributed to modern and
contemporary’s art masters (Mirò, Lichtenstein, Picasso, Dalì, Chagall, Chillida);
- defrauding of buyers.
In particular, members of the criminal group, through a rational distribution of tasks, create a complex network of counterfeiters and dealers of the counterfeited artworks, also and above all through prestigious art galleries based in Granoliers and Barcelona (Spain), San Francisco (CA – USA), Sausalito (CA – USA), Monaco (Germany) and Sao Paulo (Brazil).
Two individuals of the criminal network stand out: one of Italian and one of Spanish nationality, responsible to be promoters and organizers of the said association. Through different criminal conducts they create a real “chain”, starting from the order given to artists in possession of technical knowledge for reproduction of contemporary artists’ artworks, to the localisation of printing shops for their serial reproduction, until the distribution and sale to the public, after exportation of fakes copies from Italy and
Spain towards various European countries, United States and Brazil. This in connection with co-investigated art dealers, owners of the above mentioned prestigious galleries, served as terminals of these criminal activities.
The Spanish and the Italian individual operate also a joint account for the illicit income, being co-holder of current accounts opened with banks in Barcelona, San Francisco and Chicago, within which transfers from compliant Galleries operating in the USA were periodically accredited.
Spain
United States of America
Germany
BrazilItalyTotal seizure of 167 unique artworks and counterfeited lithographies, yet proposed for sale at the commercial value of 18 million Euros, as well as seizure of an equivalent of 74.000 Euros (56.600 UK Pounds) results of recycling.
FAILED SEIZURE OF MATERIAL EVIDENCE IN ITALY AND SIMULATED PURCHASE IN THE USA (ACCORDING TO ART. 9, PAR. 6 OF LAW 146/2006)
Within a specific activity of observation, control and shadowing (OCP), the personnel working on the case filmed and recorded the exchange of counterfeited artworks, included the phase of signing (with fake signatures) the lithographies reproducing artworks falsely attributed to Mirò.
The copies were signed “on the road”, in a parking area. With an immediate telephone call to the Prosecutor in charge of the enquiry, the Carabinieri omitted the seizure, in view to enable the transfer of these artworks from Roma Fiumicino airport to New York.
The Carabinieri were also aware that the colleagues of FBI in New York would have followed the investigation. In fact, after being marked by FBI Agents with invisible ink, the artworks were allowed for transit to reach the final destination (ie different art galleries in San Francisco and Sausalito).
Later, with a simulated purchase (13.000 US Dollars), FBI agents discovered a fake Miro lithography in an Art Gallery in San Francisco, and seized all the remaining copies in the commercial circuit.
COMMUNICATION OF OFFENCE COVERAGE TO OTHER PUBLIC PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE
In view to not compromise ongoing investigations activities and being obliged to carry out a seizure, because part of the counterfeited artworks were returning from USA (the lithographs subjected to the above mentioned omitted seizure), the investigators transmitted, upon authorization of Antimafia Directorate District, a specific crime information “under cover” to another Public Prosecutor’s Office, with which were disputed different and of less importance crimes, although falling within cultural heritage’s legislation.
This judicial escamotage, allowed to “conceal” the ongoing investigation against the suspects at international level.
EXCHANGE OF INFORMATION AND INVESTIGATIVE INTERVIEW AMONG POLICE FORCES OF INTERESTED COUNTRIES
It had been possible to contact (also through INTERPOL and EUROPOL) police offices of foreign countries in which transnational crimes were committed, involved in parallel investigations on similar criminal activities.
This allowed:
- to the Italian investigators to go in mission in Spain without request of international rogatory commission, only with a simple INTERPOL’s accreditation, in order to espertize 9 artworks by Mirò, then discovered to be false as hypothesized by the investigators;
- to return in Italy from New York (without issue of international rogatory commission, but with a simple request of the public Prosecutor to the FBI Legal attaché within the USA Consulate in Milan), a fake work by Basquiat, then delivered and seized in the locals of TPC Unit in charge of the inquiry by the same FBI Legal Attaché of the USA Consulate in Milan.
POSTAL MAIL FICTIOUS SEIZURE
At request of Carabinieri Unit, the Italian Judicial authority issued a seizure order of a postal packet, mailed in Tuscany and addressed to Barcelona, of which the investigators were certain it contained documentary material for funds transfer from a Spanish to an English account. As indicated into the seizure order, the investigators, after having successfully detected the postal packet at Orio al Serio Airport customs, copied the documentation included into the packet, and then left the postal packet free to reach its destination.
PREVENTIVE SEIZURE FOR AN EQUIVALENT VALUE
Thanks to an order of the Italian Public Prosecutor, the Carabinieri seized an equivalent value on an Italian bank account, the sum of 74.000 Euros (56.600 English Pounds), which resulted to be on an English bank account, managed by one of the major suspected individual.
It was the result of money laundering of proceedings from transnational crimes.
United States of AmericaSpainDuring the preliminary investigation, the Italian Judicial authority implemented a continuous coordination with American and Spanish Judicial Authorities, forwarding different international rogatory letters, aimed at achieving copy of the judicial documentation related to the investigation on the individuals involved.
Thanks to the coordination activated with the American Judicial Authority (U.S. Department of Justice Attorney, Northern District of Illinois) it was possible to know that the Italian and the Spanish individuals, as well as of galleries owners and “dealers” of Florida, New York and Illinois, investigations were ongoing based on mail fraud and fraud. Evidences were collected on transfer from Europe towards various American States counterfeited artworks, ready for sale in the period March 2006 - October 2007.
Investigation had been marked by judiciary police activities and controls, carried out through close coordination and/or jointly together FBI and Barcelona’s Mossos de Esquadra’s personnel, both in Italian territory and foreign countries, thanks to judicial and police co-operation’s simplified procedures, within the frame of transnational crime.
In fact, for the first time in Italy and in this particular context, the Judicial authority decided the application of specific provision concerning transnational crime, according to law 146/2006, as application of the principles of the so called 15 December 2000’ Palermo Convention.
responsible to be promoter and organizer of the OCG
responsible to be promoter and organizer of the OCG
The specialization of the criminal association, in connection with the performed illegal activities, were such to characterize the hazard and ability for “pollution” of the market, with severe damage of the history and artistic reputation of the contemporary artists involved.