News An industrial suburb of Florence, situated in the centre of Italy, the city of Prato has 180,000 inhabitants. One of its distinctive features is a very large Chinese diaspora estimated at 40,000 persons.
This very closed community operates in every sector of business activity with particular skills in leather goods and textiles, but unfortunately also in counterfeiting. Aware of the problem and in order to avoid the formation of a clandestine sector of the economy which escapes from any kind of control, the Tuscan police authorities launched a series of investigations which soon yielded results.
Since the beginning of the year, several clandestine workshops have been dismantled. Last June, a watchmaking workshop set up in a private apartment was visited by the Guardia di Finanza police force. They seized 200,000 watches or watch components which were in the process of being marked and assembled. A number of tools, punches and machines were also seized on this occasion. Four persons are now behind bars. This is just a start. Investigations are continuing actively and are certain to result in other major seizures of counterfeit goods.
August 25, 2011
