Serial cigarette smuggler jailed again
05.04.08
Serial cigarette smuggler Susan Howarth is behind bars again. The grandmother-of-three, who's secret life as a serial tobacco trafficker has seen her try to smuggle 800,000 cigarettes into the UK, was jailed for two years for her latest swindle.
The sentence marks the end of a five-year smuggling spree, which saw the 52-year-old zigzag round Europe, picking up cut-price cigarettes to sell on the black market. She was jailed at Newcastle Crown Court after getting caught with 24,580 cigarettes at Newcastle Airport.
Customs officers found her bags packed full when she landed on a flight from Tenerife, on August 22. That haul would have cheated the taxman of £4,500, but that is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Mrs Howarth’s career.
She first travelled abroad to bring back cigarettes to sell in 2002. On 13 separate trips, jetting to the continent from a host of UK airports, she managed to bring 600,000 cigarettes into the country. A year later, she was part of a gang-of-four caught with 165,840 cigarettes as they arrived at East Midlands Airport from Lanzarote. She was jailed for 18 months at Leicester Crown Court.
But her time behind bars only seemed to spur her on and weeks after her release, she was caught again, in April 2005. She had again flown to Lanzarote but returned to Newcastle Airport with 34,000 cigarettes. The duty evaded was £6,700 and she was again locked up for 18 months as city JPs sent the case to Crown Court.
Then in February last year she brought 38,000 cigarettes into Newcastle from Malaga. Mrs Howarth, who was still on licence from her last spell behind bars at the time, was given a six-month jail term.
This week the court heard on August 22, she arrived at Newcastle Airport on a flight from Tenerife. HMRC officers searched her bags and discovered 24,580 cigarettes. Again, she had travelled light on her outbound journey but emerged through the gates clutching suitcases. He bags were searched and the haul of illicit tobacco was found. The duty evaded was more than £4,500.
Mrs Howarth claimed an unnamed relative was persuading her to make trips to the continent to bring cigarettes back for a fee of £75 for rent arrears. The grand total of cigarettes she has been caught with is 799,920.
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