Shop owner handed suspended sentence over counterfeit tobacco
A shop owner has been handed a suspended prison sentence and ordered to do 150 hours of unpaid work for selling more than 12,000 fake cigarettes.
Horas Abdul Rahman pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to five charges of selling counterfeit tobacco under the Trade Marks Act and five under tobacco regulations for selling products without health warnings at his Rugeley shop.
Rahman, 34, of Osmanton Road, Derby, was sentenced at North Staffordshire Justice Centre on January 10. He was handed a 12-week prison sentence, suspended for 12 months, and also ordered to pay £480 costs and a £115 victim surcharge.
The offences took place at the Yum Yum shop in Brewery Street, Rugeley, on various dates in December 2017 and January 2018.
A total of 12,280 illegal cigarettes and 7.75g of hand rolling tobacco were seized by Staffordshire County Council trading standards officers.
Two shop workers, Osman Ameen, 39, of Tower Street, Derby and Faruk Fatah, 36, or Bennett Street, Derby, were ordered to pay over £500 each in fines and costs last month for similar offences at the same premise.
Staffordshire County Council’s communities leader Gill Heath said: “Illicit tobacco and can be particularly harmful to people’s health as it does not comply with safety and consumer regulations.
“It also evades tax which ultimately affects public services and their sale can fund criminal gangs. We are pleased therefore that our trading standards team has bought another successful prosecution which has removed illicit produce from sale and helped to protect legitimate businesses.”
Anyone with information about the sale of illicit goods can call Staffordshire’s confidential trading standards line on 01785 330356.
