open judicial investigation for scams
The Toulouse public prosecutor’s office on October 22 opened a judicial investigation for “fraud by a person in charge of a public service mission and complicity in fraud”. 17 people were arrested in connection with this trafficking of false vaccination certificates in Muret (Haute-Garonne).
Two days after the arrest and custody of dozens of people suspected of having participated in the trafficking of false health passes at the vaccination center of Muret (Haute-Garonne), the Toulouse public prosecutor’s office opened a judicial investigation for “scams by a person entrusted with a public service mission and complicity in scams”, this Friday, October 22.
The two organizers of the network, aged 19, were presented to an examining magistrate, indicated in a statement Samuel Vuelta-Simon. The Toulouse public prosecutor requested their placement in pre-trial detention. One of them is a former employee of the vaccination center, who took care of administrative tasks.
Fourteen people were also taken into police custody Thursday, October 21. These are buyers of fraudulent health passes, born between 1957 and 1999. “They will soon be prosecuted by the Toulouse prosecutor’s office”, continues the public prosecutor, and a “special attention will be given to those who have bypassed the vaccine obligation because of their employment in the health sector”.
140 buyers of fake health passes
On October 8, an investigation under the heads of “concealment of fraud and deliberate endangerment of others” had been opened, following a report from medical staff at the Muret vaccination center, near Toulouse. Practitioners noted anomalies in the recording of people vaccinated.
After investigation, the Muret gendarmerie revealed a network of fake health passes trafficking. The passes had returned between 100 and 380 euros each, continue the public prosecutor of Toulouse, either to relatives of the accused, or after the publication of an ad on Snapchat.
In total, nearly 140 people have benefited from it. Among them, personnel from the medical or paramedical sector working in the Occitanie region, underlines the prosecution. Subject to compulsory vaccination, therefore.
The investigation is now continuing under the direction of the investigating judge, with a view to identifying the other perpetrators, co-perpetrators, accomplices in trafficking and all of the beneficiaries.