More time for jailed operator
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' A former haulage company boss who is already serving four years for smu ling alcohol has been sentenced to a further two years for a string of other offences.
David Huff was on bail for four charges of theft, one of attempted theft and nine of obtaining property by deception when he evaded £300,000 in duty on 2.5 million cigarettes.
Two months before that he had been acquitted of involvement in smuggling £2m worth of cannabis resin into Dover.
Maidstone Crown Court heard last week that Huff was the sole director of Britannic International. which was based at an industrial estate in Lympne, Kent Simon Sandford, prosecuting, said the company was wound up in September 1998 because Huff's Lloyds Bank overdraft exceeded £4.000. Huff, of Elm Fields, Old Romney, Kent, should not have used the account or traded as Britannic after that date, but he continued to do so, and bought goods using the company cheque book.
The father of two bought other equipment, including tyres, by bouncing cheques after the winding up. The total value of the goods covered by the 14 charges he admitted to was more than £26.000. Sandford said this included a sevenday loan for £3,000 that was not repaid.
Judge Keith Simpson said it was "like Billy Bunter's postal order—never came through the post". Huff was on bail on these charges when he smuggled the cigarettes in April last year. They were discovered in his trailer when he returned from the Continent with his son and a relief driver.
Dominic Webber, defending, said Huff was appealing against the four-year sentence imposed on 30 November last year. He added that Huff had committed the other offences when he was under severe pressure because of debt, and had resorted to desperate measures. The company went into liquidation with debts of up to £30,000.
Simpson described Huff's record as long and bad. concluding that he had caused £26,000 in losses to people who would not get a penny in compensation. "Were it not for the fact that you are serving a four-year sentence I would have passed a sentence totalling three years." he told fluff.