Slough store owner fined for selling illegal tobacco

Slough Borough Council’s trading standards team conducted a test purchase and received illegally packaged tobacco from the Brothers Pan Corner Shop on Stoke Poges Lane, Slough, in February 2019.

A week later they returned with Thames Valley Police tobacco sniffer dogs. The operation seized 1,200 packs of cigarettes, 1,000 pouches of smokeless tobacco, and 60 pouches of hand-rolling tobacco. Much of the seized tobacco bore either non-English labelling, non-statutory health warnings or was in non-plain and branded packaging.

The director of the business at the time, Mohammed Imran Naseer, appeared at Reading Magistrates’ Court and admitted 11 charges of being in possession of the illegal tobacco.

Naseer, of High Street, Gloucester, was fined £1,000 by magistrates, ordered to pay £4,000 costs, and a victim surcharge of £110.

Dean Cooke, senior trading standards officer, said: “This is a welcome result for the trading standards team. Possessing illegal tobacco may appear to be a victimless crime. However, it is the genuine law-abiding traders of Slough that suffer, as they are continually being undercut by unscrupulous competitors.

“We can only have a level playing field when all the businesses in the borough meet their legal obligations. We hope this will serve as a very real warning to others selling illegal goods in the borough we have a zero-tolerance to this kind of behaviour.

“The council will pursue prosecutions and the financial punishments can be considerable. We will continue to monitor and act on intelligence regarding illegally imported tobacco being sold to the public.”