(Video) Chicago area retailers use black market to bypass county cigarette taxes

Chicago lakefront

Rahm Emanuel wants to raise Chicago's cigarette tax--which if enacted will only exacerbate the smuggling of tobacco in the metropolitan area and further empower the grifter culture here.

Chuck Goudie of ABC 7 Chicago reports that there are already problems in the suburbs.

The ABC7 I-Team takes us inside Chicago's tobacco underground. We open the door on a deepening black market of bogus and illicit cigarettes, made more lucrative than ever as the government continues to raise tobacco taxes.

The I-Team exposes a tobacco underground in Cook County, where profits are as high as dealing drugs-- all at taxpayers' expense.

Smokers who refuse to pay full price-- as high as $12 a pack-- turn to an easy access black market. There, for every pack of bootleg or fake cigarettes sold without a county tax stamp, taxpayers lose millions.

The I-Team went along with the Cook County Department of Revenue and sheriff's police as they raided three suburban stores and fined all of them for selling cigarettes without county tax stamps.

Here is the video:



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