The Public Funds Prosecution Office continues to investigate a number of money laundering cases, however, sources have revealed a new list that includes a number of new defendants comprised of citizens and expatriates, who stand suspected of acquiring excessive funds in their accounts, Al Rai daily said.
Informed sources reported to Al-Rai that the investigations revealed a variety of methods that may constitute suspicious money laundering operations through the selling of chalets, farms, caves, luxury cars, and public auctions including the sale of birds and animals on social media sites at prices that exceed their real value by ten times. This was noticed after a constant security monitoring period. Officials sometimes participated in auctions to gather evidence of participants in suspicious operations.
The sources pointed out that the public funds prosecution office provided the detectives with arrest and search warrants that were directly executed to undercover the crimes of expatriates, some of them outside the country who are partners with citizens involved in these operations. The prosecutors have pushed to investigate, seizing the documents that provide proof of the crimes and to shut down places allegedly involved after collecting all the evidence including documents as part of investigations to nab the criminals.
The Ministry of Commerce and the Financial Investigation Unit had submitted a number of reports to the Attorney General who referred them to the Public Funds Prosecution Office, where the latter ordered the monitoring of everyone who had participated in these crimes. Consequently, a number of citizens were detained, including a partner in a luxury car office, and all office documents were seized to uncover the crimes of the accused.