A 29-year-old Auckland businessman has appeared in the
Auckland District Court today after Customs arrested him in
relation to tobacco smuggling. He faces multiple charges
under the Customs & Excise Act and the Crimes Act, and
more charges are likely.
In early January 2020,
Customs examined a sea cargo consignment of new household
items, likely for resale, and discovered it contained 75,000
undeclared Chinese-branded cigarettes. The total evasion of
Customs duty and GST amounted to $83,365.
Initial
enquiries found the name of the person receiving the
consignment was a false identity. Subsequent investigations
linked the shipment to the businessman, and showed the use
of a number of storage facilities and P.O Boxes across
Auckland that had been opened using false identities. The
storage facilities and P.O Boxes were likely used to
facilitate illegal imports, prior to the cigarettes being
sold wholesale, using Chinese social media
channels.
Customs investigators executed several
search warrants in Auckland yesterday, 3 June, resulting in
the man’s arrest. Approximately 3,000 cigarettes and
around $14,000 in cash were also seized.
Customs
Investigations Manager Bruce Berry says the number of
illegal tobacco seizures has increased substantially in the
past few years, and this latest case is an example of the
ongoing trend that Customs has seen during the COVID-19
pandemic.
“Organised crime groups and individuals
have been somewhat constrained in their ability to smuggle
tobacco, due to COVID-19. Nevertheless, Customs has
continued to seize considerable amounts of illegally
imported tobacco in recent months, both in sea freight and
international mail.”
From January to the end of
April 2020, Customs has made 374 interceptions, adding up to
977,637 cigarettes or cigars and 65 kilograms of loose
tobacco. This excludes an additional 592 kilograms of
tobacco products abandoned by those who did not want to pay
taxes.
“Like illegal drugs, the relatively high
price of tobacco makes New Zealand an attractive market. We
are seeing both organised crime groups and opportunists
trying to smuggle tobacco into the country to evade duty and
make money. This latest arrest, once again, shows that
Customs will do everything it can to stop this illegal
activity,” Mr Berry says.
Customs has also today
welcomed the sentencing of another Auckland businessman who
was arrested at the end of 2018, in what has been Customs’
largest cigarette operation to date. The man was convicted
for smuggling 19,419,400 cigarettes, and evading over $18.7
million in Customs duty and GST. He will have to serve 5
years and 3 months’ imprisonment.
“This sentence
should send a clear message to organised crime groups and
opportunists that Customs is as focused on tobacco smuggling
as it is on other illicit commodities. The recent change in
tobacco legislation will give us an even greater ability,
from 1 July 2020, to take quick enforcement action against
law breakers,” he says.
If you have suspicions about
someone involved in smuggling cigarettes illegally, call
0800 4 CUSTOMS (0800 428 786) in confidence, or Crime
stoppers anonymously.
—
Last month, Parliament
passed legislation that closed a loophole, which allowed
some people to import cigarettes and loose leaf tobacco for
manufacturing cigarettes and ‘roll your owns’ for sale
on the black market without excise tax being paid. From 1
July 2020:
- tobacco products, tobacco leaf and
tobacco refuse will become prohibited imports and a person
will be required to have a permit to import these
products; - tobacco products cannot be received
through the international mail, they must only be imported
using a freight forwarder, the fast-freight courier system
or as bulk sea or air cargo; - any tobacco products,
leaf or refuse imported without a permit will be seized and
destroyed.
A permit is not required to import
cigars, cigarillos, water-pipe tobacco, chewing tobacco,
snuff and snus. Passengers arriving into New Zealand with
tobacco do not need a permit and individual duty-free
tobacco limits are
unchanged.
