🔗 Share this article

Organized crime groups are reportedly purchasing established transport businesses to pose as legitimate drivers and systematically steal high-value cargo, based on new findings.

Evidence has emerged indicating that several transport operations were purchased using decedent individuals' personal information, enabling perpetrators to create fraudulent commercial structures.

Elaborate Deception Operation

One transport firm was subsequently contracted as a subcontractor by an unsuspecting UK transport company. Producers then loaded one of the subcontractor's lorries with merchandise that later disappeared entirely.

The business owner, who operates a Midlands-based transport enterprise that was victimized by the fraudulent subcontractors, described the situation as "unbelievable" that "criminal elements can target businesses so blatantly".

"You need to care because it affects your finances," stated an industry expert, formerly a security director for a major retail chain.

Rising Cargo Crime Statistics

This brazen tactic represents just one of multiple ways criminals are focusing on transport companies that transport commercial stock and other materials throughout the country, with freight criminal activity in the UK rising to £111 million last year from £68 million in 2023.

Documented footage shows criminals raiding lorries during distribution, breaking into transport while stopped in congestion, removing locks and breaching depots, and stealing complete containers packed with merchandise.

Operator Experiences

Drivers, who often need to stop and sleep overnight in their vehicles, have described waking to find the curtained panels of their lorries cut by criminals attempting to access the contents within, with consignments of branded apparel, beverages and devices among the particularly common targets.

Organized Response

Police agencies have indicated that cargo crime is becoming "more sophisticated, more organized" and emphasized that police forces need to work with the industry to address the problem.

Fraud affecting hauliers - including criminals using fraudulent haulage businesses - is increasing in the UK, according to official sources.

"Our industry is under attack," states an industry representative, managing director of a prominent road haulage organization.

Complex Investigation

The deception operation appears to follow a pattern previously observed in continental Europe, where "legitimate haulage businesses on the brink of insolvency" are purchased by coordinated criminal syndicates who collect multiple shipments "and then vanish".

Following the victimization of the business owner's company, handling officers told her that authorities were also investigating similar crimes in different regions of the UK.

Detailed Case

The transport business, which moves millions of pounds throughout the nation each year, had subcontracted to a less established haulage firm for a assignment earlier this year.

"The insurance was in place, their business licence was in place," she says. "The situation appeared promising." The lorry came at the manufacturing company, filling equipment filled it with DIY items and the truck drove off, she states.

However unbeknownst to Alison and the producers, the lorry had been using fraudulent registration plates. It vanished with the cargo worth at seventy-five thousand pounds.

"Initial awareness we had about it was the destination business called us and said, 'where's our shipment disappeared to?'" Alison recalls. She attempted to call the contractor, but the number had been deactivated.

Identity Fraud Element

Therefore who had appropriated the goods? Investigators traced a convoluted path to try to establish the solution, including a dead man's personal information, a unknown Romanian female and a £150,000 luxury vehicle.

The company Alison contracted was named Zus Transport. A month before the incident, it had been sold by its previous proprietors - with no suggestion they were involved in any improper activity.

Investigation discovered that the takeover was financed by a electronic payment from a company owned by a UK-based Eastern European transport operator named Ionut Calin, who used his second name Robert.

Researchers found a group of multiple haulage businesses, comprising Zus Transport, apparently acquired by Mr Calin this year.

But Mr Calin had passed away in November 2024, verified with official sources. This was several months prior to his bank details had been utilized to acquire multiple of the companies and his name used to establish three of them at government company registries.

Additional Investigation

Exists zero basis to suspect he was involved in illegal activity, and numerous people on social media expressed respect to him as a good person who helped others in the sector.

The former proprietors of multiple of the haulage companies stated they had dealt not with Mr Calin, but with a man known as "Benny".

Investigators located him by examining the registered officer of Zus Transport named in government documents, a Romanian female. Data about her is limited, but a contact number for her was located. When searched in communication applications, it showed a profile picture of a youthful female, with a alternative identity, in a high-end automobile.

The profile picture assisted in recognizing her as a family member of Mr Calin, and the spouse of a man named Benjamin Mustata. The individual and his spouse had posed for a photo when collecting a luxury vehicle from a dealership in April, a week after the incident affecting Alison's company.

Confrontation

When shown images from online platforms of Mr Mustata to a previous owner of one of the transport businesses, he recognized him as "the pseudonym" - the man he had encountered face-to-face to discuss the transfer of the business.

A phone details