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Jailed for diesel/paraffin scam
Page 7
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• A Norwich businessman who set up a scam company self] ng a cut price mixture of paraffin and diesel to travelling showmen and hauliers has been jailed for 18 months at Norwich Crown Court.
Bookkeeper Patrick Snelling, 58, of kisham Road, had orevl ously pleaded guilty to knowingly supplying rebated fuel for road vehicle use via his company Norfolk Fuel Oils.
Snelling's partner Trevor Watts was cleared after denying similar charges.
Customs officers estimated that a minimum of 500,000 litres of paraffin were sold by the firm between March 1998 and June 2003, and the amount of duty evaded was more than £200,000. In the dock with the two men was Diss haulier Mark CroftonSleigh who was also cleared of charges of knowingly using the rebated fuel mix.
Customs officers had kept three depots in East Anglia under surveillance and followed deliveries of the fuel across the region in a curtain-sided trailer.
John Barber, regional spokesman for Customs & Excise says; "This was a largescale fraud. Paraffin and other rebated fuels are supplied to commercial outlets at low rates of duty on the understanding that they are not sold as road fuel. In this case Snelling was organising the purchases and supplying large quantities to hauliers in the Eastern region and then dealing with the monies as they came in.
"This sort of fraud not only deprives the Treasury of revenue but harms the legitimate haulier who finds his prices undercut by unscrupulous criminals.
"Customs are determined to carry the attack to those who perpetrate these frauds," he adds. "We will pursue them with the utmost vigour."