Two smugglers have been jailed after they attempted to ship four MILLION illicit cigarettes into the UK - hidden in stacks of toilet roll.
Trucker Brian Storey, 28, was stopped by Border Force officers at Dover after arriving on a ferry from France in July 2013.
Inside his HGV officers discovered cigarettes worth #919,000 in unpaid duty hidden among pallets of toilet roll.
Investigators then discovered his accomplice, Richard Watt, 38, had a credit card under a false name that he used to make Storey's travel arrangements.
Storey claimed he thought his truck only contained toilet roll and dried food and denied knowing the man who set up his trip.
But analysis of his unregistered pay-as-you-go mobile phone revealed calls with an unknown contact regarding the tobacco shipment.
The ferry booking was then found to have been made by a credit card set up with a fake bank statement and driving licence but ultimately traced to Watt's home.
Watt, of Sunderland, Tyne and Wear, denied any knowledge of the cigarettes and said he hadn't created the alias.
But he and Storey eventually pleaded guilty to the fraudulent evasion of excise duty at Maidstone Crown Court.
Watt was jailed for three years and Storey, of Ryhope, Sunderland, to two years.
Alan Tully, assistant director, fraud investigation service, HMRC, said: "This was a calculated and audacious bid to profit from the sale of illicit tobacco.
"But conspiring to sneak four million illegal cigarettes through Dover proved to be Storey and Watts undoing - it was a greedy gamble that has cost them their liberty.
"Disrupting criminal trade is at the heart of our strategy to clamp down on the illicit tobacco market, which costs the UK around #2.1 billion a year.
"This is theft from the taxpayer and undermines legitimate traders."
ENDS
