Seven Kolfontaine municipal officials were arrested on Wednesday as part of house searches by the Federal Judicial Police in the Hainaut Municipality Population Service. The Mons public prosecutor’s office confirms this, reports Belga from SudPresse.
According to SudPresse, this concerns the entire staff of this population service.
These facts are very serious. If the facts are proven, they risk two to five years in prison and fines from 500 to 100,000 euros, multiplied by eight. So it could be up to 800,000 euros, “confirms Damien Verheyen of the Public Prosecutor.
Colfontaine is a municipality in the Belgian department of Hainaut. The municipality has a population of over 20,000. Colfontaine is located in the urban area west of Mons, in the old industrial area of Borinage.
The file is the result of a complaint from FPS Home Affairs and FPS Foreign Affairs, which found irregularities in about fifteen foreign files, more specifically with regard to the issuance of identity documents and passports.
Belga: “According to the public prosecutor, these documents would have enabled illegal aliens to settle in Belgium, but for most of them in the UK.”
The first trace investigated, computer hacking, seems unlikely according to preliminary results. “The question arises whether the internal coding of incorrect information in the municipal computer system was committed by one or more employees of the municipal administration,” says the prosecutor’s office.
After a house search of the Municipality Directorate on Wednesday, seven people were arrested and detained. One of them was released. The Bergen Public Prosecutor’s Office said: “The six others will be questioned again on Thursday before they appear before the examining judge.”
“In the coming weeks, the numerous documents seized will be examined by investigators to determine whether the tokens were indeed voluntary, whether compensation was received and to assess the exact scope of the facts,” Belga concludes.
Photo: Jean-Paul Grandmont – Wikipedia
