41 police reviews after checks for labour crime

PoliceIllustration.Police.Photo: Norway Today Media

The so-called A-crimes center in Oslo investigated 863 companies last year to uncover work life crime.

It ended with 41 police reviews.

The center is a collaboration between the police, the Labour Inspectorate, Nav and the tax and customs authorities. They believe that they have uncovered 13 criminal networks in connection with last year’s checks wrote Dagbladet newspaper.

‘’These are multi-criminal enterprises” said Olav Norheim, the head of the A-crime center.

Twenty-five companies were declared bankrupt, and 168 companies were wholly or partly suspended in 2018. The controls revealed, among other things, NOK 37 million in outstanding taxes and fees.

Other things the inspectors discovered were empty companies where millions of kroner are deposited to pay untaxed salaries to painters and construction workers living in illegal and poor homes. In addition, they discovered social security fraud, money laundering, and tax evasion.

“In many places, legal and illegal activities are mixed” said Norheim.

“It is not so often we see wholly-untaxed business, even though we do see it too. What we often see are businesses where there is a legal part and also an illegal part. There are criminals who try to establish themselves in business” he said.

© NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today