Two men who had been convicted of smuggling 9.1 million cigarettes in Belfast have had €30,305 confiscated and forfeited to the State at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
Stephen Watters (45) of Kilcurry, Dundalk, Co Louth and Niall Trainor (43) of Beamish Avenue, Newry, Co Down, each received a 30-month suspended sentence at Belfast Crown Court last June for knowingly being concerned with the fraudulent evasion or attempted evasion of excise duty on the cigarettes.
The men had been arrested in January 2011 on the Forkhill Road in Newry, along with four other people after they were caught with the counterfeit cigarettes. Trainor was later convicted after he denied the charges.
Watters pleaded guilty to this offence and a similar offence in relation to the evasion of duty on 100,000 cigarettes for which he received an 18- month suspended sentence.
Routine profiling
Both men were stopped in Dublin Airport on January 7th, 2010 as they were about to board a connecting flight to Frankfurt which was to bring them on to Sofia in Bulgaria.
John Byrne, acting for the Revenue, read out an affidavit prepared by Custom and Excise officer Marian Conneally in which she outlined that both men were travelling together and were stopped under routine profiling.
Watters admitted that he had €10,000 on his person and had a further €5,000 in his checked-in luggage.
An examination of the suitcase, which had been checked-in by Trainor, revealed €9,000, which was found in a bag and the pockets of a pair of jeans.
Trainor admitted he had about €5,000 on his person and a further €5,000 in his suitcase, which he claimed Watters had given him the previous night. It transpired he had €5,505 on him and €5,800 in his checked-in luggage.
The men claimed the cash came from legitimate sources and they were planning to purchase a consignment of energy drinks from a Bulgarian company which they named as Gold Street Distribution Ltd.
Watters said he also owed money to the same company and intended to repay it on arrival in Bulgaria.
Judge Nolan said he had “no problem at all” in coming to the conclusion that although the cash may have come from legitimate sources it was intended for use in criminal activity.
He acceded to the State’s application and ordered that the cash be seized and forfeited.
When asked by James Dwyer, defending Trainor, what he believed the cash was intended for, the judge replied: “If I am pushed, I will say that I think they were intending to buy cigarettes to bring back with them.”
Mr Dwyer told the judge the State was “simply saying that this all stinks, you didn’t provide an explanation, we are going to keep the money”.
He submitted that “Bulgaria is a place where cash is king” and that the State had not investigated the legitimacy of Gold Street Distribution.
“The State are ignoring the evidence and are playing the man and not the ball,” Mr Dwyer said.
Joseph Jackson, for Watters, said his client carried the cash in high denominations because it was less bulky. He said the banking system in Bulgaria was not reliable or efficient and it was easier to get good bargains with cash.
Balregan Engineering
Watters told officers that he had an Irish company, Balregan Engineering, which dealt with haulage and warehousing and was a supplier of vegetables and high energy drinks. It later transpired that that company was fully tax compliant.
Watters claimed he employed no staff but Trainor told officials that he worked as a driver for Watters’ company and the man had given him the cash found in his suitcase.
Watters told officers he sold the drinks to wholesalers on the Long Mile Road in Dublin but was unable to provide details of the company name or his contact there.
Watters later provided invoices in relation to the sale of the drinks from Gold Street Distribution but Mr Byrne pointed out that the amount owed was expected to be repaid via electronic transfer and the invoice included the bank account details of the Bulgarian company.