Pretoria - Another suspect linked to the “Bezuidenhout group” has been arrested by the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation and the South African Revenue Service (SARS) as they continue to investigate the illicit gold industry.
According to the revenue service, the suspect, a well-known Boksburg businessman, is expected to make his first appearance tomorrow in the Boksburg Magistrate Court where he will be added as a co-accused for the role he played in the syndicate.
The businessman is expected to apply for bail.
The “Bezuidenhout group” is an alleged illicit gold industry syndicate which was in the news earlier this year when five of its members were arrested on charges of racketeering, money laundering, serious tax offences and offences relating to the Precious Metals Act and Second Hand Goods Act.
Their case was subsequently postponed to 30 October 2015 for further investigation.
The Bezuidenhout group had allegedly fabricated over 16 000 fraudulent invoices to reflect purchases of second hand gold jewellery amounting to R442 million.
The fictitious purchases were used in claiming a fraudulent 14% notional VAT input over the period of 2010 to 2012, in addition to also understating their sales during the same period.
“SARS had suffered an actual prejudice in excess of R50 million due to this scheme,” said SARS.
Since the arrest of the five accused, further investigations uncovered additional suspects who participated in various roles in the syndicate, from funding the scheme, to smelting of illegal gold and fabricating documents by masking the illegal gold as second hand jewellery in order to facilitate the illegal gold into the legitimate gold trade. – SAnews.gov.za
