The 23 arrested persons accused of being members of criminal organizations of antiquities theft are brought to the prosecutor’s office after a major operation by the Organized Crime Division of Northern Greece.

Shortly after 12 noon, the 14 accused were transferred, accompanied by strong police forces, to the Thessaloniki Magistrate’s Court, while the remaining 9 will be brought before the prosecutor of Serres.

According to reports, police officers had been targeting the antiquities thieves since last September, while most of them have been in the authorities’ sights in the past. Among them is a man who worked as an employee at the Antiquities Department in Serres.

They were mainly “hunters” of coins and other archaeological finds who would locate them with metal detectors, dig to acquire them and then illegally dispose of them for sale.

In fact, according to the same information, those arrested are accused of carrying out illegal excavations even near archaeological sites. Moreover, in their telephone communications they used code names in order to avoid being noticed.

The officers of the Sub-Directorate for the Fight against Organized Crime of Northern Greece managed to arrest them after a month-long investigation and after “combing” at least 30 different places in Thessaloniki, Imathia, Serres, Kozani and other areas of Central Macedonia.