• A truck driver has claimed Ire was threatened into
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carrying a massive consignment of drugs into the country after being held responsible for more than ,2300,000 cash being seized by Customs officers.
Jeffrey Garforth said he believed cannabis was in the truck containing a load of fruit trees when it arrived at Dover docks on 12 December 1998.
But Maidstone Crown Court has heard it held a £9.3m cocktail of ecstasy, cocaine, amphetamine sulphate, and cannabis.
Garforth said he had been driving for a number of companies in this country and on the Continent.
On 10 May, transport company boss Andrew Howard bought a lorry for his fleet. The paperwork was made out to Garforth International. "I was going to lease a vehicle from Andrew and he paid for it," Garforth told the jury "I didn't have a vehicle and I was just going to start my own company up."
Garforth, of Margate, Kent, sajd that on 14 May he was asked to take a box across the Channel. He went in a car driven by a taxi driver and was accompanied by another lorry driver, Derek Holness.
But he was stopped and searched by customs officers who seized the 034,000 they found inside.
"I didn't know there was money inside it," he said. "I didn't know what was inside the box. I can't say if the person who asked me to take the box is in court. The repercussions of this have put both me and my family at risk."
Garforth admitted he lied when he told Customs he was on his way to deliver leaflets for his new business. Holness, he said, had asked to go on a trip with him.
"I assumed the box was
something illegal," said Garforth. "I didn't know it was anything to do with drugs. I had never been involved in drugs.
"I was told that the people were not happy about losing their money. I was told a week or two afterwards that I would have to do something to reimburse them. I would have to bring something in."
Asked if he was frightened now, he replied: ''Yes, because I don't know who I am dealing with. I am frightened for my family." Eleven men deny conspiracy to smuggle drugs.
The trial continues.