A truck driver who attempted to smuggle 2.6 million cigarettes in to the UK in a load of dry pasta has been sent to prison.
The cigarettes were discovered when a truck driven by Andrzej Imanski was stopped by Border Force offers at Dover Eastern Docks in April 2016.
They were hidden in 30 of the 32 pallets aboard the truck, in packaging that was identical to the boxes containing the pasta.
HMRC, which investigated and prosecuted Imanski, estimated that he had evaded £645,398 in excise duty.
The Polish national was found guilty on 27 October following a three-day trial at Maidstone Crown Court. He was sentenced to three years in prison.
Alan Tully, assistant director for the fraud investigation service at HMRC, said: "Imanski assumed the pasta boxes would hide his illegal cargo of smuggled cigarettes, but they were discovered and he’s now in prison."
