William Molinié, edited by Ugo Pascolo 10:00 am, December 03, 2021
Europol is launching this Friday its new campaign of "Most Wanted", the most wanted fugitives, to try to put an end to the run of several major criminals. Each member state is invited to include a high intensity target on this list. Redoine Faïd and Salah Abdeslam were featured in their time on this platform, accessible on the internet. And this year, it is a high-caliber drug trafficker who interests the French authorities.
His name is little known.
And yet to believe the French investigators, it is a "big fish".
Joël Soudron, a 42-year-old Guadeloupe, has just been registered by France in the list of "Most Wanted", the most wanted fugitives by the European agency Europol.
He is suspected of having organized a vast traffic in cocaine between Latin America, the West Indies and Europe.
But above all for having laundered millions of euros in French-speaking Africa.
A major trafficker
Specialized investigators trace back to him for the first time in 2011, during an investigation following a customs seizure in the port of Le Havre of 230 kg of cocaine in a container from the West Indies.
During the searches, 280 other kilograms of cocaine and 230,000 euros in cash will be seized.
Suspected of being the sponsor of this load, Joël Soudron would have been at the head of around thirty such expeditions since 2005, without ever having aroused the slightest suspicion.
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"He stands out, he is very discreet, very intelligent"
The police found his trace in Bamako in Mali in 2016, he was then arrested on the spot and handed over to France. But on September 6, 2018, he was granted an exit permit and made his way by disappearing from the radar. "He stands out from the crowd, he is very discreet, very intelligent, with a lot of influential networks. It is believed that he laundered a lot of money in French-speaking Africa, especially in real estate companies. He now has a surface area. financial astronomical on the African continent ", indicates at the microphone of Europe 1 the head of the national brigade of search for fugitives.
Among the working hypotheses, the investigators think that there are happy days today, very probably under another identity.
And that he has most certainly put aside the international drug trafficking, too dangerous, to concentrate on the valuation of his laundered booty.
Any information likely to locate it can be placed anonymously on Europol's "Most Wanted" platform.