In Almaty region, 17 members of an organized criminal group were sentenced for illegally registering over 800 vehicles. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing Sputnik Kazakhstan.
According to the Financial Monitoring Agency, the criminal group earned 6.6 billion tenge over two years by not paying registration and recycling fees for vehicles. Initially, 642 trucks were illegally registered.
Later, the criminal group also profited from illegal registration of passenger cars. For this purpose, VIN codes of old cars were assigned to illegally imported vehicles. Thus, registration and recycling fees were not paid for 209 passenger cars.
The illegal scheme involved police officers, employees of specialized CSCs, and private notaries. They entered false information into information systems and issued powers of attorney in the name of fictitious persons.
During the investigation, car owners voluntarily paid the initial registration fees, resulting in the return of over 1 billion tenge to the state.
The court sentenced each member of the criminal group to imprisonment from 2 to 11 years, depending on their role and level of participation. Additionally, five cars purchased with criminally obtained funds were confiscated to the state.
Four former police officers were stripped of their special ranks. Notaries were banned from engaging in notarial activities. The verdict has not entered into legal force.