A 27-year-old business owner was arrested on 24 March 2023 at about 11:00 and will be appearing in the Bloemfontein Magistrate court soon on charges of fraud, contravention of the Consumer Protection Act, contravention of the Immigration Act, and other related contraventions.
On 24 March 2023, an intelligence led and multi- disciplinary operation spearheaded by the Free State Provincial Organised Crime Unit in conjunction with Crime Intelligence, Provincial Tracing Team, Tactical Response Team, Cyber Crime, Department of Small Business Development, Tourism and Environmental Affairs (DESTEA) and South African Revenue Service (Customs) SARS, led the team to East End Industrial park in Bloemfontein where liquor suspected to be counterfeit valued at about R1 million rand and illicit cigarettes were discovered at a liquor distributor.
