Germany secures landmark organised-crime convictions in €200 million VAT carousel case

Summary 

• The Düsseldorf Regional Court convicted two defendants in the EPPO’s Operation Goliath investigation into an intra-Community VAT fraud scheme involving electronics trading and Hawala money laundering. 

• The defendants received prison terms of seven years and two months and five years and eight months. EPPO describes the judgments as the first German EPPO convictions expressly recognising defendants as members of a criminal organisation. 

• The case shows the increasing convergence of VAT fraud enforcement, organised-crime prosecution, asset tracing and cross-border financial investigation. Businesses in high-risk trading chains should reinforce supplier, customer and transaction-level due diligence. 

Extended article 

The European Public Prosecutor’s Office has announced a significant enforcement milestone in Operation Goliath. The investigation concerned an international network trading consumer electronics through missing traders and buffer companies, with illicit proceeds also channelled through Hawala arrangements. 

The Düsseldorf Regional Court convicted a Turkish national as a member of a criminal organisation and as a perpetrator of VAT fraud in 26 cases, together with aiding and abetting fraud linked to ten shell companies. A Danish national was convicted of supporting the organisation and aiding and abetting VAT fraud in five cases. Both had already been convicted in March 2025 for other conduct within the same investigation. 

The enforcement significance lies not only in the estimated fiscal damage, but also in the criminal-law characterisation. Treating the structure as an organised criminal enterprise gives prosecutors a framework that goes beyond isolated tax offences and supports a broader focus on controllers, facilitators, money flows and confiscation. 

For legitimate businesses, the case reinforces the need for controls that identify commercially implausible chains: rapid movement of high-value electronics, newly incorporated counterparties, unexplained margin compression, mismatches between contractual and logistical flows, unusual payment routes and repeated changes in suppliers or bank accounts. 

External links: EPPO announcement on the 2026 convictions | Earlier EPPO indictment in Operation Goliath

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