Around 1.5 million cigarettes have been found hidden inside concrete blocks at Hull docks by our officers. Officers uncovered the haul on Thursday night (2 December) following checks on lorry freight arriving from Zeebrugge in Belgium.
A group of illegal tobacco traders from Barnsley has been convicted after being caught with over 2-million illegal cigarettes destined for the local market.
Five Merseyside men have been arrested and almost 10-million illegal cigarettes seized by officers from HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC).
Police and trading standards have seized hundreds of counterfeit cigarettes and packets of tobacco following a raid on two homes on Gateshead’s Springwell Estate.
Two Manchester men who pretended to import Christmas snowmen in a plot to smuggle nine million cigarettes into the UK, have been jailed. The cigarettes had a potential tax loss of over £1.4 million.
Four men have been given suspended jail sentences after being caught selling illegal cigarettes at a Bolton market.
A father and son team from Sunderland has been sentenced after selling illegal tobacco and alcohol from their city centre store.
Six members of a gang who used high-tech equipment to turn out 24 fake bottles of vodka a minute, plus large quantities of hand rolling tobacco, were jailed at Southwark Crown Court today for more than 56 years.
A former football club chief executive has been jailed for five-and-a-half years after admitting to not paying duty on £4.5m-worth of cigarettes.
A Lancashire gang who imported over two million contraband cigarettes into the country packed inside wheelie bins has been jailed for a total of almost nine-years.
