05.06.22
Spanish police have dismantled a criminal network that sold fake COVID-19 vaccination certificates, El Periodico
reports. Among those on its client list, totaling over 2,200 names, is José María Fernández Sousa-Faro, president of pharmaceutical giant PharmaMar.
According to authorities, the 76-year-old businessman employed the service so that the National Vaccination Registry would show he had taken the third dose. At a price somewhere between €1000 and €2000 (a ‘VIP fee’), it enabled him to evade governmental strictures on travel. Relatives are claimed to have followed his lead. According to sources connected to the case, Sousa-Faro will soon be summoned to present himself in court.
Only the latest prominent figure to be named in a months-long investigation, Sousa-Faro joins many other luminaries from various fields. Among these are actors Verónica Echegui and Álex García; artist Omar Montes; the Australian tennis player Álex de Miñaur; Trinitario Casanova (one of Spain’s wealthiest men); soccer player Bruno Gonzalez Cabrera; former beach volleyball Olympian Fabio Díez Steinaker; doctor Camilo Esquivel; former boxer José Luis Zapater; rap singers Jarfaiter and Anier; and Kidd Keo, a hip hop singer...
Under the umbrella of ‘Operation Jenner,’ named after the English developer of the first smallpox vaccine, Edward Jenner, authorities have been tracking down those thought to be in possession of false COVID-19 certificates...
According to a later report by El Periodico, a Spanish undercover agent stumbled upon the scheme while tracking Islamic extremists. He had infiltrated Telegram channels where such elements—including would-be terrorists—gathered...
Subsequently, the officer alerted his superiors after which a judge authorized the investigation to continue. The infiltrator’s new circle of ‘friends,’ all French nationals of African extraction, offered to charge him €250 for a vaccination certificate. As a guarantee, they went so far as to send him a trial one. Investigators verified its authenticity, as the agent, under his operational name, was now registered in the national health registry. This saw the birth of ‘Operation Jenner,’ which tracked down and finally rolled up the criminal enterprise within Spain’s borders.
Apart from Spanish outlets (some major, such as
El Mundo), and much smaller foreign ones, the news thus far remains woefully underreported in European media.