From: nj1015.com
Organized crime has found a new way to make a big profit: by illegally transporting cigarettes into New Jersey and other Northeast states.
Cigarettes are being bought in huge quantities in states like Virginia, where the tobacco tax is very low, and then shipped up the I-95 corridor to New Jersey and New York where taxes are very high, and resold illegally.
“Smuggled cigarettes have become the new currency of organized crime, and a lot of these criminal organizations are finding that it’s more profitable than illegal narcotics,” said Rich Marianos, the retired Assistant Director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
He said nationwide, states are losing more than $5.5 billion in tax revenues.
