A shop owner has been sentenced in court after admitting to selling illicit cigarettes in Nottinghamshire.
Reben Mohammed, who also lived at the shop where he worked in High Street, Stanton Hill, was caught by Nottinghamshire’s County Council’s trading standards with illegal and counterfeit cigarettes.
The Trading standards team recovered 1,080 cigarettes and some counterfeit cigarettes, along with a small amount of tobacco which was genuine but had the duty evaded.
During an interview, the 27-year-old admitted to being the owner of the shop and also to selling these cigarettes but insisted that he wouldn’t continue to do so.
Last month, a test purchase was carried out at the shop during a second visit and following a search recovered 540 cigarettes and 150g of tobacco which included cigarettes which would not self extinguish and are therefore deemed unsafe and counterfeit cigarettes.
When questioned again, he said that he was planning to return the cigarettes to the man who supplied them to him.
He admitted two charges of possession, custody or control in the course of a business certain goods, with a view to selling, offering, or exposing for sale or distributing the said goods without the consent of the proprietor of the said registered trade mark.
He admitted a further two charges of possessing for supply cigarettes which were dangerous products.
He also admitted a further two charges of failing to comply with Safety Regulations.
Councillor Glynn Gilfoyle, Committee Chairman for Community Safety at Nottinghamshire County Council said: “We are very pleased with the outcome of this case. We are determined to keep up our war on illegal tobacco and this is another good result in court.
“It is a very important area of our work. Genuine cigarettes have a safety feature which means they extinguish if they are left unattended; counterfeit cigarettes do not have this feature. Nationally the cost of smoking related house fires is estimated at £507 million per year.”
Mohammad was sentenced to a total of six months imprisonment, suspended for 12 months, 250 hours community sentence and has to pay £240 costs, when he appeared at Mansfield Magistrates Court last week.
