From: The Hillingdon & Uxbridge Times
A CRIMINAL gang from London has been jailed for a total of more than 15 years after smuggling millions of cigarettes into the UK inside boxes of fruit and vegetables delivered to Uxbridge.
Three men evaded over £3 million in duty by using their freight company – Scanwell Freight Services Ltd in Feltham – as a cover to ship in illicit cigarettes from Dubai.
More than 14 million smuggled cigarettes were repackaged into laundry bags at an Uxbridge warehouse and delivered to addresses in the Midlands.
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The group was led by Feroz Batliwala, who has an address at Ringway in Southall. He orchestrated the purchase, shipping and delivery of the contraband from his Dubai home to East Africa. The cigarettes were then concealed inside boxes of fresh fruit and veg and flown into the UK.
