The net took place early Sunday evening in a parking lot in Noyal-Châtillon-sur-Seiche south of Rennes.
In hiding all weekend, twenty gendarmes, supported by a helicopter and four customs investigators, arrested three individuals in the act of smuggling cigarettes.
The accused are "two men in their forties, from the Armenian community and residing in the Rennes metropolitan area, alleged sponsors, as well as a Polish truck driver in their sixties, in charge of of the delivery of the goods by means of a road unit owned by a Polish transport company ”, specifies in a press release Philippe Astruc, public prosecutor of Rennes.
By searching the van that came into contact with the truck, the gendarmes got their hands on nearly 1,300 cartons of cigarettes and a sum of 33,500 euros in cash.
Summoned to court on February 3
The next day, a fourth person suspected of running a retail outlet for contraband cigarettes in Cesson-Sévigné was also arrested.
The searches carried out at various points made it possible to "find more than 5,000 euros in cash and 200 other cartridges presented under the same brand as those discovered in the van", underlines the prosecutor.
After checking with the cigarette manufacturer, it turned out that "all the cartridges discovered were from counterfeit".
The three main suspects were brought to the prosecution on Tuesday.
They were placed under judicial supervision pending their hearing scheduled for February 3 before the criminal court.
They face a ten-year prison sentence.
The truck driver was released.
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Miscellaneous
Reindeer
Cigarette
Traffic
Smuggling