FLASH
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The Albanian police sold it as their own success, but in fact the operation was the work of the Venice police.
Italy has debunked Ilir Proda's propaganda regarding arrests abroad. Today, the police announced in the media a large-scale operation in Dubai where Bujar Sefa, part of the Rrajave group, was arrested. The police sold it as a success, boasting that another international wanted person was arrested.
" As a result of the cooperation of the State Police structures with their counterparts, within the framework of the operation codenamed 'The Wanted', it became possible to capture in the United Arab Emirates and arrest with the aim of extradition to Albania, the citizen: - BS alias BX, 39 years old. This citizen was declared wanted by Interpol Tirana, after the Special Court against Corruption and Organized Crime, with the decision dated 23.05.2023, assigned him the security measure 'Arrest in prison'... ", the police said.
But the reality is different. The operation was led by the Italian police. He is wanted by the Venice police, after being sentenced to 10 years in prison for drug trafficking. It was the Italians who found his location. According to an article in “ Il Gazzetti ”, the Italian authorities were monitoring his family and his wife went to Dubai, finding the place where he was hiding. Meanwhile, the Albanian police themselves have not mentioned this fact at all and do not even mention the Italian police at all.
Full article
“Sooner or later, we catch them all” is the motto of the Italian State Police and, as this case proves, it is more than a slogan. Life on the run becomes more difficult every day for those seeking justice, even when they take refuge abroad. Cooperation between international police forces, advanced technologies and the persistence of investigators to see their mission through to the end have yielded results: Bujar Sefa, 39 years old, an Albanian with a long-term residence in Noale (Venice province), has been arrested in Dubai, where he had built a “golden exile”.
Sefa was sentenced to a total of 10 years and 2 months in prison for international drug trafficking, of which he had served 2 years and 10 months in pre-trial detention during 2018. He was not an ordinary figure in the underworld, but a real boss of an organization that, in the second decade of the 2000s, had flooded the Italian provinces of Venice and Treviso with tens of kilograms of cocaine, mainly in the areas of Mestre, Scorzè, Noventa di Piave, Jesolo and beyond. The drugs came from the Netherlands and Albania, and were distributed in sophisticated networks controlled by criminal structures where Sefa had a leading role.
arrest
He was arrested thanks to a fatal mistake: his wife, pregnant with their child, traveled to Dubai to spend the end-of-year holidays with him. The Venetian police had long had information on his whereabouts and were keeping close relatives under surveillance, anticipating such a move. With close coordination between the Central Operative Service of Rome (SCO), the Albanian and United Arab Emirates police, the operation was finalized.
The head of the Venice police, Eugenio Masino, was notified at five in the morning of the execution of the arrest warrant, issued by the Venice General Prosecutor's Office, for a final sentence of 7 years, 3 months and 10 days in prison. "We had long known where Sefa was, but the challenge was to finalize the arrest. On the Italian side, we had everything prepared: the international request and the authorization for provisional arrest. Thanks to close cooperation with the Emirati and Albanian authorities, we managed to concretize everything in time," explained Masino.
He added that until the last moment there was a suspicion that his wife would not be able to make the trip due to her pregnancy and that the couple could meet in Albania or a third country. “But we were prepared for any eventuality,” Masino stressed.
Since taking over the Venice investigation team about a year and a half ago, Masino has made identifying and arresting fugitive figures a priority. "A few months ago we arrested another one in Switzerland. Today, drug trafficking is dominated by Albanian groups, who have built structures that seriously compete with Italian organized crime. They have become the 'primula rossa' of international crime," he said.
Fines
Bujar Sefa's final sentence comes from three different criminal trials, in which he was defended by lawyer Fabio Crea. In Venice he was sentenced in the first instance to 12 years and 9 months, a sentence that was reduced to 5 years and 4 months. In Bologna, he was sentenced to 3 years and 4 months, which was added to the sentence in Venice for a total of 5 years and 10 months. Meanwhile, in Padua he was also sentenced for a case of violence to 1 year and 6 months in prison.
Sefa's arrest was publicly welcomed by the region's president, Alberto Stefani, who described drug trafficking as a scourge that poisons cities and empowers organized crime. "Thank you to the State Police, the Central Operational Unit, international cooperation and the Emirati authorities. This is a result that shows that crime has no safe haven anywhere," he declared.
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