Counterfeit CDs worth £245,000 seized at Manchester Airport

The country’s biggest ever haul of counterfeit CDs has been seized at Manchester Airport in a multi-force crackdown on a major international smuggling scam.The 1.2-tonne consignment of music, with a street value of £245,000, was smuggled in from Hong Kong.It included Rolling Stones, Queen and Taylor Swift albums – destined to be passed off as legitimate and sold on the internet over Christmas.Officers say the discovery has smashed a large-scale international counterfeit scam, believed to date back a decade, and worth more than £20m.Manchester Airport Border Force officers found the CDs – which were passed off as MP3s on paperwork – when they inspected freight that had arrived.Their find was the culmination of a joint investigation  by the airport’s Border Force officers, the City of London Police FraudInvestigation team and anti-piracy investigators BPI and IFPI.A further 20,000 CDs were also seized by City of London Police officers from a warehouse in Lancashire and a man from Morecambe interviewed as part of an ongoing investigation.DI Kevin Kirton, who headed up the fraud investigation team, said their suspicions were alerted when the smuggler started selling CDs on well-known internet sites, under-cutting major firms by about 50p.He said: “His competitors were wondering how he could sell at those prices. This was a major international business exporting across the world.”After gathering evidence for six months, a delivery was tracked down to Manchester Airport.DI Kirton added: “We were surprised by the extent of the counterfeit CDs and I would call this just a snapshot of what’s been going on.  We think it’s been going on for a decade, probably selling CDs worth more than £20m.”He said the smuggler had cleverly mixed in genuine CDs with the counterfeit to cover his tracks – and some of customers would have received the real thing.“They were being sold in such a way so customers would think it was a legitimate bargain.”“It feels good to have been involved in an operation that protects the public who may have been duped, especially at this time of year when budgets are so tight.”Border Force and Trading Standards are warning festive shoppers to be careful about what they buy and where they buy it from to avoidfuelling the illegal trade.In a separate operation, officers found Manchester was also the intended target city for £5 million worth of fake goods intercepted at the Port of Felixstowe in October.Border Force officers at Felixstowe stopped a shipment of fake designer luggage, bags and purses worth £4,818,092.They also uncovered  a shipment of 7,688 pairs of fake UGG boots worth £920,160, and a fake load of Hermes which would have a genuine
retail value of £120,000.

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