Twelve million euros in wads of notes hidden in false ceilings and another eight million euros behind plaster partitions. In total, agents of the internal affairs office of the Spanish National Police found 20 million euros in the walls of the house of chief inspector Oscar Sanchez Gil, who is none other than one of the heads of the economic and tax crimes unit within the Madrid Judicial Police, specializing in the fight against money laundering. On November 6, the search at the home of this 48-year-old man, father of three children, in Villalbilla, a town located 35 kilometers east of Madrid, lasted more than twelve hours. One million euros was also discovered in his office, in his police squad, in Madrid.
At the end of his police custody, the National Court, the high court responsible for organized crime cases, placed Mr. Sanchez Gil in pre-trial detention, indicted for “ drug trafficking, money laundering, membership in a criminal organization, corruption and revelations of official secrets “. Never has a case of corruption within the national police reached such magnitude. “He was a person with an austere appearance, all colleagues are in shock”explains a police source to World.
In total, the police made fifteen arrests, including Mr. Sanchez Gil's partner, also a police officer, as well as his sister-in-law, who had created a VTC licensing company in 2018, suspected of having been used to launder money. commissions paid to police officers by drug traffickers, in exchange for information on current police operations. Another part of the funds would have been laundered through the purchase of cryptocurrency.
“A serious problem of corruption”
Before being appointed to the Economic and Tax Crimes Unit approximately four years ago, Mr. Sanchez Gil had worked for five years in the Drugs and Organized Crime Unit. His contacts with drug traffickers could date back to this period. It's been more than a year, according to the daily El Mundothat the police were investigating this man. However, his arrest was hastened after the record seizure, on October 14, in the Andalusian port of Algeciras, of a cargo of 13 tons of cocaine hidden in containers of bananas coming from Guayaquil, Ecuador. Destined for a fruit import company in Alicante, in southeastern Spain, this shipment of cocaine is the largest ever seized in Spain and the second largest in Europe. According to police sources, the drugs were intended for a Balkan cartel. The owners of this shell company, a couple, fled, undoubtedly after being warned of the police raid.
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Source: Lemonde