A Greek exporting company currently under investigation for issuing bogus checks came onto the radar of customs officials at Athens International Airport earlier this month after an employee was caught traveling with large quantities of unregistered gold and silver to Germany, the newspaper Kathimerini reported.
Members of Elyros, whose headquarters are listed as being located in central Athens, were arrested in October on charges of issuing bad checks for the purchase of products that were then sold on to markets in neighboring Balkan countries.
On April 12, customs officials at the Greek capital’s main airport arrested a 32-year-old German national registered as an Elyros employee after finding him in possession of 470 kilos of silver, seven kilos of gold and 293,000 euros ($380,355) in cash. He was unable to present any documentation verifying if the cargo was legally acquired.
Two members of Elyros’s board of directors are already in pre-trial custody and warrants are pending against another two members for fraud, money laundering and other related charges.
They are accused of writing bogus checks for large quantities of consumer products, from tractors to foodstuffs and detergents, which they then allegedly gathered in warehouses and exported to Albania and Bulgaria. The company is believed to have written bad checks worth 1.2 million euros ($1.55 million) to at least 57 businesses.
Kathimerini said that sources in the Financial Crime Squad (SDOE) believed that Elyros was working in partnership with a large “precious metals trading company” that is based in central Athens and has a department in Germany, a suspicion that was confirmed by the 32-year-old during questioning. Investigators believe that the unnamed company was using bogus invoices issued by Elyros in order to illegally export large quantities of gold and silver to its shop in Germany.
Gold companies are proliferating in Greece during a crushing economic crisis, offering to buy gold and precious metals from people desperate for cash.
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