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Moldovan immigration ring leader sentenced in Portugal

December 31, 2009
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The head of an illegal immigration group, a 40-year-old Moldovan living in Lagos [Algarve] has been sentenced to eight years in prison. The group falsified documents, bribed public officials and had links to the Employment and Professional Training Institute (IEFP).

Hundreds of Moldovan immigrants obtained visas to work in Portugal through an illegal scheme set up in the Algarve and involving civil construction businessmen and a "connection" at the Employment and Professional Training Institute. There was also an attempt to bribe a staff member at the Romanian embassy in Portugal. The head of the group has been sentenced by the Supreme Court of Justice.

The group was made up of Portuguese, Moldovans and Romanians, and made hundreds of thousands of euros by forging documents and offering bribes to government officials.

The scheme was set up by a Moldovan woman residing in Lagos: with a degree in accounting, Galiana V. was working in a restaurant when she "devised" a way to obtain work visas for her compatriots in exchange for 2,000 euros, initially, and 2,500 when the scheme was working in a more "articulated" manner, including in Moldova where group members "recruited" people interested in coming to Portugal.

The visas were issued at the Portuguese embassy in Bucharest but the process began in the Algarve and depended on the acquisition of a fictitious promise of work. To obtain these so-called "offers" of work, the group used civil construction businessmen who received between 300 and 600 euros for each signed document.
All the immigrants' documents were sent to Galiana V., who according to the authorities "controlled the whole process" ending with the acquisition of a consular visa. She remained in constant contact with the remaining members of the group to avoid "mistakes, lack of coordination and delays": a difficult task given the high number of immigrants involved.

Once all the documents had been gathered - including copies of passports and false work offers - it was "essential" to obtain the go-ahead from the IEFP, without which it is not legally possible to have a visa to come to Portugal.

For this reason, Galiana set up a "privileged relationship" with a member of staff, C.J., who in exchange for cash "gifts" and gold objects "quickly facilitated the necessary procedures" for the approvals to be granted while "ignoring the irregularities he detected", among them the "fictitious" work offers.

The case would then proceed to the Labour Directorate-General and once the bureaucracy was concluded, it was delivered by members of the group close to the Portuguese embassy in Romania.

The same people would collect the visas and sometimes the "service" included accompanying the immigrants to Portugal, for payment in cash.

The group tried to "open" a privileged channel at the embassy in Bucharest having offered a member of staff money for "fixing visa applications and switching identities between applicants already registered ". But the staff member did not oblige.

The scheme was also used to enable the legalization of immigrants who were already living in Portugal - as was the case of Alexandru who paid 1,500 euros for a work contract.

Diario de Noticias (Portuguese newspaper)

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