Prefecture Employee Accused of Selling Residence Permits to Drug Traffickers

According to La Dépêche, the case dates back to 2022, when the Moroccan authorities reported suspicious movements of a French national between Morocco and Haute-Garonne. The investigation conducted by the Anti-Drug Office (OFAST) of Toulouse made it possible to identify a drug trafficking network, several members of which are based in France, and which was also specialized in the trafficking of false identity documents.

The case was then entrusted to the Office for the Fight against Illicit Migrant Trafficking (OLTIM) of Toulouse, which managed to establish the link between a young civil servant at the prefecture of Béziers and the criminal network. Investigators suspect the thirtysomething of fraudulently issuing residence permits to Moroccan nationals, drug traffickers for the most part, in exchange for payment.

She would have issued a total of about forty residence permits in exchange for 15,000 euros for each document. This traffic would have earned the employee nearly 500,000 euros. The investigation is ongoing, under the supervision of the Béziers prosecutor’s office. It will make it possible to determine whether the suspect acted under threat. One of the employee’s superiors at the Béziers prefecture was also arrested. He is accused of negligence, or even active complicity.