Huge £2.5 MILLION haul of fake and ‘unsafe’ Chanel, Armarni and GHD products seized.
This is the shocking haul of fake designer products discovered in raids across the city – and they’re worth a staggering £2.5 MILLION.
Counterfeit goods posing as Chanel, Dior and GHD products were seized as police and National Trading Standards officers swooped addresses in Birmingham.
The huge haul worth £2,500,000 was found during searches at a home in Hall Green and a storage unit in Digbeth last Wednesday (Jan 9).
It took two days for officers to clear out the warehouse in Digbeth, which was packed with tens of thousands of counterfeit products.
It included handbags, watches, purses, belts, electrical products, footwear, sunglasses and accessories – all printed with big luxury brand names.
Michael Kors, SuperDry, Louis Vuitton, North Face, Stone Island were just a few of the names on the dodgy and ‘unsafe’ gear.
https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/huge-25million-haul-fake-unsafe-15699021
Lear MoreDRI busts gold smuggling racket; 4 held.
Sleuths of the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence have busted a gold smuggling racket by arresting four persons including the kingpin on Wednesday. A total of 20 kg of gold worth nearly Rs. 7 crore was seized.
The sleuths conducted raids in parts of the city and nabbed four persons. The kingpin, from Choolaimedu, revealed that his operatives fly to Mumbai and Delhi airports.
“They meet passengers smuggling gold in the transit area and then fly back to Chennai with the gold. They bring out the smuggled goods with ease as there is no checking in domestic terminals. Most often the gold is smuggled from Dubai,” said a DRI officer. The gold is sold in the grey market.
Apart from the gold, the officers seized Rs. 21 lakh and a luxury BMW car used for transporting the smuggled gold to various places.
Lear MoreThai customs to burn more than 600,000 pirated goods worth THB39 million.
The Thai Customs Department hosted one of its semi-regular “destruction ceremonies” yesterday in which 604,456 confiscated pirated items, worth more than THB39 million (about US$1 million), were trucked out to be disposed of in what we’ve been assured is environmentally friendly fashion.
Given our recent air-quality situation, we can all be happy they’re not destroying them in the classic fashion, which has routinely involved giant, camera-friendly bonfires held in the open.
At a 2pm press conference, Customs spokesperson and consultat Chaiyut Khamkhun explained that the confiscated knock-offs of brand name bags, shoes, soccer balls and tumblers would be sent to be destroyed in Saraburi province, reported Khaosod.
The destruction will be handled by INSEE Ecocycle, a waste management services solution company, while Wongpanit Suvarnabhumi Recycle Station Co., Ltd. will handle the disposal of the remains.
https://coconuts.co/bangkok/news/thai-customs-burn-600000-pirated-goods-worth-thb39-million
Lear MoreGold Worth Rs. 6.8 Crore Smuggled Into India From Dubai, Sri Lanka Seized.
The Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) has arrested four people for allegedly trying to smuggle gold valuing about Rs. 6.88 crore into the country from Dubai and Sri Lanka, according to an official statement issued today.
All the four accused -the kingpin, his aide and close relative, and two carriers — have been remanded in judicial custody, it said.
Acting on inputs, the DRI officials on Tuesday seized 20.6 kg gold, valued at Rs.6,88 crore, kept hidden by the syndicate at a residential premises in the city, the statement issued by the agency said.
A BMW car used to deliver the smuggled gold and Rs. 21 lakh were also seized, it said.
“Interrogation of the apprehended persons revealed that the Chennai-based kingpin, a resident of Choolaimedu, used to organise operatives who would work in the domestic sector to various airports, collect gold bars from transit passengers at the respective airports and carry them back to Chennai in the domestic sector and hand them over to the kingpin and his aides,” the DRI said.
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Quebec man arrested after traffic stop nets nearly 3 million smuggled cigarettes.
A 64-year-old Quebec man is in jail pending a bail hearing after a traffic stop netted 2.96 million contraband cigarettes Monday.
A Napanee OPP officer stopped the U-Haul the man was driving on Highway 401 in Greater Napanee at about 12:45 p.m.
With the help of the contraband tobacco enforcement team, his investigation revealed the cigarettes, which were seized by police along with the truck and several thousand dollars in cash.
The man, whom police did not identify, was to appear in court in Napanee on Tuesday afternoon to face charges including two counts each of possession of contraband for the purpose of sale, transportation of contraband and failing to comply with a probation order. He is also facing two charges under Ontario’s Tobacco Tax Act.
Lear MoreNew Toy Association Report Exposes 3 Main Factors Contributing to the Rise in Counterfeit & Knockoff Toys Sold Online and Details Potential Solutions
It’s a scene from any parent’s worst nightmare. Just last month, a child received a gift of what looked to be a popular magnetic toy set that comes in various rainbow-colored shapes and encourage kids to build and create. But in fact, the toy was an illicit product sold by a third-party vendor via a popular ecommerce site, and did not comply with the strict safety standards and regulations that toys are subject to in the United States. As a result, an unknowing consumer was able to purchase the set, and the four-year-old was able to easily break apart the toys to ingest more than a dozen magnets, causing a life threatening situation.
The proliferation of copycat and unregulated toys via online marketplaces raises significant safety and health hazards for consumers. The Toy Association’s new white paper, “The Real Threat of Fake Toys: The Increase of Knockoff and Counterfeit Toys Sold Online & How to Fight Back,” identifies three main factors contributing to the upsurge in knock-off, counterfeit, and otherwise illicit toys being sold via online marketplaces, including: insufficient vetting by marketplaces of sellers and products sold online; a burden of enforcement that is disproportionately placed on the IP rights holders (the brand owners); and consumers who are largely unaware of the scope of the problem and unknowingly purchase these products thinking they are held to the same standards as toys sold by legitimate companies.
“Safety is the U.S. toy industry’s number one priority and one child injured from a toy is one too many. Counterfeit products break laws, risk lives, and should not be sold anywhere, but can be abundant on some online marketplaces,” said Steve Pasierb, president and CEO of The Toy Association. “Strong action must be taken to address these abuses. The toy industry is calling on all ecommerce marketplaces, the government, and all other stakeholders to work together to effectively and swiftly fix this problem before another child is needlessly injured by a counterfeit toy.”
Added Pasierb: “Consumers have come to rely on ecommerce platforms to provide discounted pricing and wide selection of name-brand quality toys also found at brick-and-mortar retail. However, under the current marketplace system, illicit sellers with little or no accountability take advantage of this consumer faith by offering inferior and unsafe counterfeit toys that put our children at risk. Anyone selling toys in the U.S. must be held to the same high safety standards that apply to the toy brands consumers have come to know and trust.”
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Customs Dept seizes smuggled cigarettes worth RM7.25m in Port Klang.
The Royal Malaysian Customs Department seized 9.7 million cigarette sticks estimated at RM7.25 million, in an operation at the Container Inspection Field here on Jan 4.
Customs director-general Datuk Seri T. Subromaniam said a 35-year-old shipping agent was also arrested during the operation.
“We inspected a 40-foot container and found D-Blend and Canyon brand of cigarettes which have been smuggled into the country.
“The 9.7 million cigarette sticks seized were estimated at RM776,000 with unpaid taxes amounting to RM6.5 million,“ he told a press conference which was also attended by Customs assistant director-general (Enforcement) Datuk Azimah Abd Hamid here, today.
Subromaniam said the contents of the container were falsely declared as gloves, phone accessories and cooking utensils on the Customs forms.
Lear More£10,000 worth of fake goods in Bucks to be destroyed.
Time has been called by Trading Standards officers on more than £10,000 worth of counterfeit alcohol, cigarettes and designer clothes seized in the past three years.
Around 4,500 illegal or dangerous items, locked away in their evidence strongroom in the bowels of County Hall, Aylesbury, must now be disposed of to make room for seizures during 2019.
Lawrence Eldridge, who supervises investigations for Buckinghamshire and Surrey Trading Standards, said the goods to be disposed of had either been seized during operations, forfeited after successful prosecutions, or signed over to investigating officers by co-operative traders.
Where possible goods will have the fake brands removed so that they can be re-used through charities. Where that isn’t possible, or something is dangerous, the goods are destroyed.
https://www.mix96.co.uk/news/local/2779899/10000-worth-of-fake-goods-in-bucks-to-be-destroyed/
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Leicester man jailed after gang caught with 1.2 million illegal cigarettes.
A man from Leicester caught red-handed in a car park has been jailed for his role in a huge cigarette smuggling plot.
Atlaf Umarji was a member of a gang which was arrested with more than 1.2 million non-duty paid cigarettes outside a Little Chef in the Stoke area in January 2014.
The operation, led by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) investigators, resulted in the seizure of a haul of 777 branded cigarettes, worth more than £600,000 in unpaid duty.
Umarji, of Gwendolen Road, attempted to escape in a van and was filmed throwing cigarettes out of the window as he drove away, HMRC said.
The 50-year-old and his accomplices – Paul Taft, Surinder Heer and Mark Taylor – appeared at Stoke Crown Court last week and pleaded guilty to fraudulent evasion of excise duty.
https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news/leicester-news/leicester-man-jailed-after-gang-2420428
Lear MoreKorean Women Caught In Chennai Trying To Smuggle 24 Kg Gold Under Clothes.
Two Korean women passengers were detained for allegedly smuggling 24 kg of gold worth Rs. 8 crore by the customs department at the Anna International Terminal today, officials said.
The customs officials detained two South Korean women who were found walking in a suspicious manner as if they were carrying a heavy load.
Acting on specific inputs, the air intelligence unit personnel of the department intercepted the passengers who arrived from Hong Kong, an official press release said.
A personal examination of the two revealed 12 gold bars weighing one kg each concealed in their inner garments, it said.
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