11m cigarettes smuggle gang jailed

Members of an international criminal gang from the Black Country and Staffordshire involved in smuggling around 11million cigarettes were today jailed.

Donald Southall, 55, from Gospel End Road, Sedgley, along with Robert Horton, 43, from Church Road, Norton Canes, Cannock, pleaded guilty to smuggling the cigarettes from Eastern Europe and evading the £1.7 million duty due.

Horton's partner, Julie Henworth, 42, from the same address, pleaded guilty to laundering the proceeds of their crime.

The three were jailed for a total of 11 years and four months at Northampton Crown Court today following an investigation by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC). Southall and Horton were sentenced to four years and eight months, Henworth to two years.

HMRC spokesman Adrian Farley said: "This was a large scale international tobacco smuggling plot which took our investigations all over Europe.

"With the support of law enforcement colleagues in Hungary, Portugal, Spain, Slovakia, Austria and France, we have broken up this gang and are now working to take away the proceeds of their crime."