LONDON: A trucker Thomas Kent, 45, was stopped by UK police with £500,000 cash. He was attempting to smuggle out this cash in his spare tyres. He was jailed by police as he attempted to drive his vehicle transporter onto a ferry in Portsmouth, Hampshire.
The carrier was loaded with Transit vans and Kent, who worked for Manchester-based haulage firm Motor Movers, claimed they were for a client in the Mondragón area of northern Spain.
Border Force officers became suspicious when they discovered spare tyres in the back of one of the vans that did not fit any of the vehicles.
Further investigation led to them finding £500,000 stuffed inside three of the mystery wheels.
Kent of Brighton, East Sussex, denied attempting to remove criminal property from the UK, but was convicted after a trial.
He was sentenced to five years in prison by a judge at Portsmouth Crown Court.
The jury heard the money was likely to have been used to finance drug deals in Spain.
The amount seized was roughly the same as the cost of purchasing 20 kilos of cocaine at wholesale price.
Robert Holness, from the National Crime Agency’s Border Policing Command, said: ‘This was a significant amount of money and the way it was being transported, concealed within tyres, immediately made us suspicious.
‘By seizing this money we have derailed a deal which has kept dangerous drugs off the streets and has prevented criminals making a profit to reinvest in further crimes.’
In a previous trial the boss of Motor Movers, John Tague, 51, from Lancashire, was acquitted of the same charge.
