Two foreigners are secretly trying to bring 402,000 euros into Latvia; criminal proceedings have been initiated

The Tax and Customs Police Department of the State Revenue Service (SRS) has initiated criminal proceedings for the transfer of 402,475 euros of allegedly criminally obtained cash across the border of Latvia, SRS informs.

The service states that in February, undeclared cash in the amount of 402,475 euros was discovered during customs control measures for a car with German license plates at the Latvian-Lithuanian border crossing point “Grenctāle”.

A German citizen and a Moldovan citizen were in the vehicle, who had not declared cash, could not explain and present documents of the origin of the money. During the customs control, the persons were asked whether cash should be declared, to which both persons answered in the negative.

Taking into account that it was not possible to carry out the in-depth control on the spot, it was decided to do it at the customs control point of the Freeport of Riga in Riga, with the participation of a canine specialist of the SRS Customs Administration with a working dog for searching for cash. Following this statement, the German national stated that there was cash in the vehicle of approximately €400,000, which he wished to declare.

The undeclared cash found was seized and the persons arrested, according to the SRS. All withdrawn money has been deposited in the Treasury account. Persons released and security measures not related to deprivation of liberty applied to them.

The criminal process has been started for the criminal offenses provided for in the third part of Article 195 of the Criminal Law for the possible laundering of criminally obtained financial assets, if it has been committed in a large amount.

In the initiated criminal proceedings, five sanctioned searches were carried out, including four of them in Riga, one in the Mārupe district, during which additional cash funds – 102,240 euros, 45,466 US dollars, as well as banknotes in other currencies – were seized.

The SRS states that according to Article 19 of the Law on Criminal Procedure, no person is considered guilty until he is found guilty of committing a criminal offense in accordance with the procedures specified in the Law on Criminal Procedure.