During the raid near Girona in North-West Spain, representatives of the Spanish national law enforcement authority, Policía Nacional, confiscated 14 copies of luxury cars, including four ready-to-sell counterfeit Ferraris. The counterfeiters planned to offer the illegal copies for sale on various online platforms for used cars.
The investigators became aware of the criminal operation as a counterfeit car that violated Ferrari’s intellectual property rights was offered for sale. In the course of further investigations, they were able to locate the counterfeiters as well as their illegal factory.
The counterfeiters allegedly utilised pre-owned mid-class cars from brands such as Ford, Peugeot and Toyota for their counterfeits. They disassembled the used vehicles and changed their appearance with specially constructed coachwork components so that they mirorred the appearance of the original vehicles. They also applied counterfeited brand logos and pasted over the dashboard displays to make the copies appear more realistic.
The imitation luxury cars were also equipped with forged registration papers. In addition to plagiarising cars, the counterfeiting ring will also have to answer for drug dealing: The investigators also discovered a fully-equipped cannabis plantation during the raid.
