They were so lifelike that the manager of a famous auction house Golden Road According to case documents accessed by OPEN CASE, a company from Madrid had to approach Chanel and Dior to verify that these were indeed fake bags. The alert came to light in September, when a customer who had sold them a bag in May contacted them via email and sent four luxury new items up for auction: Chanel brandblack and white and quarter Christian Diorbeige.
At first glance, the bags were exact copies of the originals; their manufacturers even copied the letters of authenticity and maintenance manual for each piece. They actually managed to pass the company’s initial filters, but employees of the auction house, located in the Salamanca neighborhood of Madrid and familiar with the very expensive genre, managed to detect a small, barely perceptible detail in one of these Chanels. a mistake in the stitching a label that distinguishes it from the originals.
Sold for 2,750 euros
They decided to consult brand representatives, who did preliminary work on the bags and confirmed their suspicions: “Although these are very successful creations, there are differences in the stitching, the letter of authenticity and the care guide. They are not original“.
The company’s manager reported the fraud to police and admitted to agents that the alleged fraudster had previously filed criminal charges. I ‘sneaked’ a Chanel for them black four months ago. He later explained that they saw nothing at the auction house that made them suspect the bag might be fake, so they included it in an in-person auction held on June 29. 900 euro starting price. According to the summary, a bidder bought it for 2,750 euros, of which the alleged fraudster kept 2,245 euros.
UDEV Central Intellectual and Industrial Property Crimes Branch II. In the investigation carried out by the group, it was determined that the woman selling the fake bags 53-year-old Ukrainian Tetiana The 75-year-old Austrian retiree lived with his partner in a luxurious urban development in Torrevieja (Alicante).
The first thing the police confirmed was that the couple was quite active in several courier companies. They both sent and received many packages. In recent months, agencies have increased their total 27 posts by woman It was to take place in different countries in Europe: Ireland, Romania, Italy, Austria, Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, France, Belgium, Poland, Greece and Estonia.
According to the investigations, it was stated that these were “shipments consisting of a single package, weighing between 1.5 kilos and 3.6 kilos”, and therefore “it can be concluded that the shipments contained in these packages may contain imitation bags or luxury products”. researchers conclude:
Türkiye Trip
It was also learned that the woman traveled from Valencia to Turkey by plane between October 3 and November 21. The police were impressed by the destination and reported in their report that “Turkey is a Huge market for fake productsIt is defined as the leading center in the production and distribution of imitation products, including bags and fashion products.
The bags were so well made that only the Science Police could uncover more differences between the replicas and the originals. Therefore, according to the report, the Christian Dior that the woman sold to the Madrid auction house is just different from the original model. a leather label and “while the original bags of the brand have only the upper part sewn and the manufacturing code on the back, the fake bags do not have the code because they are sewn on all sides.”
It was even harder to spot fraud on some Chanels. One of them even had a tag bearing the identification number that matched the authenticity card inside the bag. However, the fake label bearing the iridescent Chanel double C monogram on the company’s bags “did not change color depending on viewing angle or lighting conditions.”
A suspicious package
On the very day Tetiana returned from Turkey, a worker A Post Office headquarters in BarcelonaThe company, with which agents had already made deals, notified police that it had received a “suspicious package” sent by the woman to an online auction house in the Catalan capital. Several agents from the Barcelona Cyber Crime Unit went to this office, together with Post Office officials, scanned the package and opened it after confirming that it was a bag.
Inside a safe, they found a salmon-coloured Christian Dior in an ornate presentation box. The launch price would be 700 euros. Police took a statement from the person regarding the incident auction house They said he had to collect the bag and, as in the Madrid case, they found that Tetiana had managed to evade the controls at least once. The company was about to auction it for 1,200 euros. a pink Chanel He said the woman sent them a few days ago.
an accomplice
The manager explained that the only reason they haven’t sold yet is because they haven’t signed yet. starting price Your bag with Tetiana. “We called his cell phone and a man who didn’t speak Spanish picked up the phone and handed me over to him, and I was having trouble understanding him in Spanish and English.”
According to Correos data, Tetiana sent them the bag from her office a week ago, on November 15. A courier company from Torreviejaattracted the attention of researchers. If the woman had been in Turkey that day, how could she have managed the shipment from Spain? This is how they discovered that Tetiana had an “accomplice”. Examining the security cameras of the workplace, the police determined that the person who sent the package was his partner, a retiree named Valeri.
Both were arrested on 12 December, they refused to testify before the Torrevieja 4th Court of Inquiry, which heard the case, and Accused of fraud and crimes against industrial property, The police report states they could face up to eight years in prison and the amount defrauded is estimated to be around €50,000. During a search of their home, agents found eight bags of Chanel, Dolce & Gabbana, Dior and Louis Vuitton brands in their respective boxes and labeled in the couple’s dressing room. Also included are four sunglasses from Maybach, Dior and Chanel; and a belt of the second brand.
Next to the bedroom dressing room, police seized two cards containing two different models of Chanel bags and two Dior labels, as well as a handwritten agenda and two receipts to be sent to two auction houses. On the prisoner’s computer, they found an active and open profile of the man on the screen trying to sell three items on an eBay trading page: a Chanel bag and belt and another Dolce & Gabbana bag. When the agents arrived at the house, Valeri had Chanel’s official website open on her computer and was checking “the original price of one of the items she had posted on eBay.”
Frustrated by the police operation, the couple already had a new target: They had contacted the popular auction house Sotheby’s to show interest in doing business with them, according to data collected by the police.