Police take down international luxury fake gang
The fake products allegedly are produced in a factory in Guangzhou.
Thirty-seven suspects in China allegedly involved in an international gang producing and selling fake luxury fashion products have been caught, Shanghai police said on Sunday.
The gang, headed by a group of suspects based in Dubai, allegedly produced the fake products in China and then sold them to distributers in the Middle East.
The suspects were caught in concerted action by police in Shanghai and Dubai on July 30.
In Dubai, 20 suspects were caught in the action with over 21,000 fake products seized, while in China, police seized over 7,000 fake garments and bags of brands such as LV, Hermes and Chanel.
The authentic counterparts of the fake products seized are worth about 1.8 billion yuan (US$260 million), according to the police.
Shanghai police said they started their investigation after one of the intellectual property owners reported to them in May this year that fake products found in Dubai were probably imported from China.
The main suspects, based in Dubai, established two trading companies in southern China in 2011, and hired workers to make the fake products on orders from overseas.
The fake products either were purchased or produced in a factory in Guangzhou run by a man named Zhan, police said.
The products were allegedly transported to Dubai through a logistics company run by another suspect who allegedly used false declarations and mixed fakes with authentic products.
Police said the fake products were sold by over 200 distributors in the Middle East as authentic “on discount.” Certain limited edition bags sold at over US$10,000 each.
Within the three months from July 25, a total of 6,197 suspects have been caught in 2,668 IPO case. The authentic counterparts of the fake products involved were worth about 7 billion yuan, according to the ministry.
