Wimbledon company KANN Trading Ltd was ordered by Kingston Crown Court this month to pay over £150,000 following a successful prosecution by Merton Council’s trading standards team last year.

Trading as http://www.tvdeals.tv, the company was found guilty in June 2011 of selling counterfeit household goods over the internet. They were then fined £5,000 and the directors Navaid Ahmad and Atif Mahmood both received 12-month suspended prison sentences, 240 hours community service and a three-month curfew monitored by electronic tagging. They were also disqualified as directors for seven years and the judge ordered the surrendering and destruction of the fake goods.

Proceeds of Crime action was then taken against the pair to retrieve the money they made from their crimes. At the final hearing on 21 November, the judge at Kingston Crown Court ordered Ahmad to pay £100,388.06 from his criminal activity within two months and pay £7,500 in costs. Mahmood also had to pay £7,500 costs and was told that he should pay back proceeds of crime amounting to £44,300 within three months. Merton Council will receive £50,000 of the confiscation amount. The judge warned Ahmad and Mahmood that they will be sent to prison for two years and 16 months respectively if they fail to comply with the order.

Merton Council cabinet member for environmental sustainability and regeneration Councillor Andrew Judge said: ‘This is a just outcome for this wrongdoing to ordinary people. Merton’s trading standards team put a great deal of time and effort into this case and are to be congratulated on the result. It sends a clear signal to those who dupe the public by selling counterfeit goods, that we will not tolerate this behaviour. We make sure that carrying out this type of crime in Merton does not pay. We will pursue relentlessly those who rip off the public and flout the law.”

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