BOLZANO. From 2015 to 2017, they would have collected several million euros in Veneto – at least 6 – ensuring very advantageous double-digit returns, thanks to investments in Latvia in the telecommunications sector, as reported by La Tribuna di Treviso. But then the investors no longer saw anything: the sums paid had evaporated along banking paths that from Eastern Europe took the routes of accounts in Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, Holland, the Czech Republic, the Slovak Republic, Lithuania, Spain and England.
International scam? According to the judiciary, there were grounds for configuring the crime – also on the basis of the complaints presented – but the statute of limitations came into force, from June 2023. And so, three suspects saw the case against them opened by the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Treviso.
But three others – the Bolzano financial promoter Dietmar Peter Atz, 60 years old from Salorno, registered with Aire, and the Treviso men Cristiano De Noni and Michele Meneghin, the first, 53 years old, resident in San Fior, the second, 57 years old, in Cappella Maggiore – they will still go to trial. Judge Cristian Vettoruzzo asked for them to be compulsorily charged for the crime of financial abuse, which was not time-barred at the time of the hearing which was supposed to evaluate the opposition of the accused to the dismissal ordered by the prosecutor due to the statute of limitations of the crime of fraud.
This request was rejected by the investigating judge, who also ordered the indictment at the same time for the illegal exercise of capital raising. According to the accusation, the unfortunate individuals were proposed to open a Latvian telecommunications startup, which had the aim of raising capital in Italy to be merged with the company Api Connect Sia, based in Latvia. Initial contribution of 60,000 euros, as an entry fee, with the promise – reports La Tribuna di Treviso – of huge profits for the company, and 60% of these returned to investors as a practically guaranteed income.
In fact, according to what Atz & Co. assured, whoever paid the money would collect 30 to 40% of the amount invested every year. But subsequently, apart from having news on the monthly performance of the shareholding, nothing further reached the investorsboth in terms of income accounting and profit sharing. If not, surprisingly, the proposal to transform the credit accrued towards Api Connect into the purchase of shares in the Api group.
In the meantime, in fact, Api Connect had been made part of a holding company – Api Telco Group Jsc – controller of several other companies in Riga, such as Api Mobile Sia, Polaris Tlc Sia, Kl Holding Sia and others. From then on there would be absolute silence from Atz and his collaborators, even in the face of the request to get the money invested back. The South Tyrolean promoter, according to the complaints, declared that the Latvian government had blocked the company’s current accounts. However, after a tax check he was apparently untraceable.
Between 2020 and 2021, investors presented themselves to the Financial Police to file a complaint against Atz and his collaborators, hypothesizing the crimes of fraud and embezzlement. The investigations started from there, now the trial begins.