A Malta-based firm, Age Limited, has been implicated in a massive €20 million fraud accused of having swindled the European Union.
Age Ltd is registered at Floriana’s Mall Complex, and its directors appear in the companies’ registry as Johansen Annmari, from Milan, and a British Virgin Islands company Bowey Holdings. Age Ltd’s company secretary is Angelo Salvatore, from Bologna. Both Annmari and Salvatore have been accused of fraud.
The Italian Guardia di Finanza smashed the fraudsters’ network after two years of investigations.
Antonino Scimemi is alleged to be the mastermind who, along with Giuseppe Sala De Cesare, a company representative for Energia Pulita Srl and Sebastiano Cocola, an administrator of Heron Srl, financed the construction of two industrial plants for the production of biomass with EU money – without actually investing the money in the project itself but instead directing most of the cash to various personal accounts.
According to investigators, Scimemi made use of false fiscal invoices to justify the alleged expenditure on the project. Both Energie Pulita and Heron acquired services from the Malta-based firm Age Limited, which provided false invoices for work which was never carried out.
Age was responsible for the provision of goods and services, invoiced at a higher price than their real value, as well as for products or services which were never delivered. The invoices would be presented to the financing bank administering the EU funds, which would be used to pay Age.
Age would then transfer the funds to Bowey Holdings – its shareholder in the British Virgin Islands, or to Nordheim International and Gaphill Holding in Panama. The money would fly back to San Marino bank accounts, and poured into the companies SGM Srl and GM Srl, both owned by persons in Scimemi’s network.
Orders for seizures were issued for the companies Energy Pulita and GM in Trapani, Heron in Ragusa, and SGM in Rome. The accused are Antonino Scimemi, Giuseppe De Cesare Sala, Sebastiano Cocola, Salvatore Renda, Paolo Nassano, Johansen Annmari, Angelo Salvatore and Antonino Bendici.