Manchester Airport cigarette bootlegger jailed
15.02.08
A 35-year old man was jailed for four years on Monday at Manchester Crown Court for his part in a major counterfeit cigarette smuggling scam. Colin Haines of Isleworth, Middlesex was charged with being knowingly concerned in the fraudulent evasion of Excise duty relating to the illegal importation of 8,270,000 counterfeit cigarettes from China in June 2005.
HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) officers originally arrested Mr Haines in October 2005 in relation to a single illegal importation when he was working for a freight company based at Manchester Airport. During the operation HMRC officers recovered a total of 8,270,000 cigarettes equating to a duty evasion in excess of £1.7 million.
The subsequent HMRC wider investigation found that there had been other suspicious importations, leading to the seizure of over 25 million cigarettes. There was insufficient evidence to link Haines to each seizure but it was clear that the smuggling scam was larger in scale, and during the wider investigation in 2005 over 34 million cigarettes were seized.
At the time of his arrest / the offence Mr Haines was living in Stoke on Trent, Staffordshire. He provided HMRC investigators with a false version of events, although he eventually pleaded guilty on his first appearance at Crown court in December 2007.
In court the Revenue & Customs Prosecution Office (RCPO) said that Mr Haines had misused his position to provide an avenue for others to attempt to undermine the procedures put in place to protect against the illegal importation of goods from outside the UK. Although charged in relation to a single importation at Felixstowe in June 2005, all indications were that he was involved in a much bigger smuggling enterprise.
In mitigation, defence counsel said that he had received a 'fee' of £20,000 for assisting and facilitating the illegal importation. He had accepted the 'inducement' from others unknown on the basis that he was severely in debt and he 'bitterly regretted' his actions.
In court this week, His Honour Judge Hammond said that he saw both the ‘amount of duty put at risk’ of evasion and Mr Haines role in ‘using his knowledge and position to provide an air of legitimacy to the importation as highly significant’. He added that, if the case had gone to trial, a sentence of in excess of six years may have been warranted, but due to Mr Haine's guilty plea and allowing for other factors he was willing to allow a reduction in sentencing, and therefore gave him four years imprisonment.
Mr Haines now faces a confiscation hearing scheduled for the end of March 2008 under the Proceeds of Crime Act.
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