Seized gold offered at Garda auction after crime-proceeds convictions

This report is a localnews.ie summary based on public court reporting and records; sources are listed below.

Gold bullion valued at €1.4 million was offered for sale through an online auction on behalf of An Garda Síochána, with the net proceeds earmarked for the State.

Wilsons Auctions was conducting the sale following seizures by the Dublin Crime Response Team during a drugs investigation. The operation involved September 2024 searches in Lucan, Dundrum and Ballsbridge. Gardaí also found €460,000 in cash and cocaine and ecstasy with an estimated value of €210,000.

Gold bars and coins weighing 18kg, together with cash, were found at a business premises. The drugs were discovered at a residential property.

Svethana Bahtijeva was sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to possessing the proceeds of crime. Her mother, Jelene Idele, also pleaded guilty to possessing crime proceeds and received a four-year prison sentence, suspended in full.

Both women denied knowing about a drugs business and said they did not know the full extent or origins of the contents of the safety deposit boxes and safes. They had not been the initial targets of the investigation.

The court heard that Bahtijeva felt controlled and directed by her husband. Idele said she considered her son-in-law dangerous and had acted under his direction. She was caring for her grandchildren while her daughter was in custody.

Bahtijeva’s husband, the main suspect, had absconded after being granted bail and was believed to have returned to Kazakhstan. The court accepted that the marriage had ended and neither woman had contact with him after he left Ireland.