Jailed for lorry swindle
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A NORTH Shropshire haulage firm was swindled out of a lorry and trailers worth nearly £12,0 0 0, Shrewsbury Crown Court heard on August 6.
William Henry Mansfield of Five Oak Green, Tonbridge, Kent, who is currently serving an eight-year prison sentence for drug smuggling, admitted obtaining a Daf tractive unit and two trailers by deception from Vincent Huxley, of Prees.
Mr Mansfield was given an 18-month jail sentence, to run consecutively with his current sentence — making it a total of nine-and-a-half years.
Michael Elson, prosecuting, said the Vincent Huxley haulage company advertised the lorry and trailers for sale in trade journals in July 1984.
Mr Mansfield replied to the advertisement and it was agreed that the lorry and trailers would be delivered from Prees to his company,' Valid Flow Limited of Kent.
It was agreed that payment would be made by a banker's draft but when the Vincent Huxley driver delivered the goods to Mr Mansfield he was paid with a cheque for 01,787.50. The cheque later bounced, Mr Elson said.
The police were called in after Mr Mansfield had broken several promises to pay.
Mr Elson said it was clear Mr Mansfield had insufficient money to honour the cheque. His company's overdraft stood at 114,500 and his personal account was more than .0,000 overdrawn.
The tractive unit and trailers had been sold by Mr Mansfield on the day of their delivery to Kent. One of the trailers had been exported to Portugal and the other was still in the possession of the person who bought it from Mansfield. Police had recovered the lorry unit.
Pc Peter Beddoes of Whitchurch said Mr Mans field was serving an eightyear prison sentence imposed by a Reading court in May for illegal importation of heroin at Heathrow airport. He also had a previous conviction which was very similar to the Vincent Huxley deception.
For Mr Mansfield, John Black disputed the allegation that it had been a well planned deception Mr Mansfield, he said, had known the state of his bank account at the time but believed a large sum of money would be arriving to cover the cheque.
He had, said Mr Black, set up in business with the help of the London-based Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank after he last came out of prison and had been involved in a series of previous transactions, including one with Vincent Huxley in which everything had been completed "by the book".