Video: Counterfeiters jailed for plot to flood UK with £20 forgeries

A JUDGE has jailed four men, including three from Yorkshire, for their part in a sophisticated multi-million pound counterfeiting operation intended to flood the country with fake £20 notes.

More than 1m in forged and partially completed notes was seized and the gang had paper ready to print 4.8m more at a secluded farm in Wales in one of the biggest scams of its type ever uncovered in Britain.

Lee Mitchell, the skilled printer behind the forgeries, and his assistant Christopher Brooke were already awaiting sentence for another illegal printing operation in Leeds before they went on the run to the farm in Mold.

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Leeds Crown Court heard yesterday that 318,000 in forged notes were found in circulation from that first enterprise based in a rented house in Broad Lane, Stanningley, Leeds, from where 180,000 in partially-completed notes along with printers, scanners and other equipment were seized in June last year.

By the time police smashed the second operation in Wales in May this year almost another half a million pounds-worth of forgeries had been circulated.

They traced Mitchell back to the farm after watching him hand over more 381,000 in one batch in a Welsh pub car park to West Yorkshire jeweller John Hartley for storage in his vault before onward circulation.

The master forger had been able to improve the notes even more after keeping his secret computer printing technique on a USB stick which was not found at the time of his first arrest.

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Hartley's Range Rover was stopped near Saddleworth Moor and the notes seized while the farm was raided the next day, with the printing operation found behind a fake wall in a garage.

Mitchell, 39, of Greenside, Pudsey and Brooke, 29, of Swinnow Gardens, Bramley, Leeds, were each jailed for a total of 12 years for the counterfeiting offences with a further two months consecutive for jumping bail.

Hartley, 61, of Cheltenham Road, Bradford, was jailed for five and a half years and the farm owner Ian Cole, 56, of Golftyn Lane, Northope, Wales, for six years.

All four admitted conspiracy to tender or pass counterfeit currency, Mitchell also admitted making counterfeit currency in Leeds where Mitchell and Brooke both admitted having equipment to make counterfeit notes.

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Sentencing them, Judge Paul Hoffman said the operations were sophisticated with high quality notes being produced on a commercial scale.

They also demonstrated Mitchell's skill and expertise as a professional forger as well as his criminal determination clearly not daunted by his first arrest.

He said there had to be long sentences to deter others since offences of that nature undermined confidence in the economic system as well as loss to the public.

The judge commended the police team and others involved in the investigation for cracking two big counterfeit operations which had started to flood the market with fake notes "which would have caused a lot of people to lose their money."

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Michael Smith, prosecuting, said Mitchell was a key player since without his skill as a graphic designer there would be no operation. According to a Bank of England expert the forgeries were high quality with even the watermark cleverly faked.

Mitchell claimed to have sold the notes produced in Leeds for 2 each. He had known Cole having previously met him in prison when Cole was serving time for drug smuggling.

After the case Det Insp Warren Stevenson of West Yorkshire Police's Crime Division said it was a complex investigation closing one of the biggest counterfeiting operations ever discovered.

"Officers have been able to recover over a million pounds worth of counterfeit cash and part-produced notes as well as the equipment used to create the money. This has prevented the notes circulating around the country and leaving residents and businesses with worthless cash."

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He said the gang were "driven by greed and were using the fake notes to fund their lifestyles" and hoped the sentences would send out a message that such operations would be traced and closed down.

"Counterfeit cash does affect the economy especially local businesses that end up with cash which is worthless."

Victoria Cleland, Head of Notes Division at the Bank of England said: "Maintaining the public's trust in our banknotes is a key role for the Bank and it is essential if the economy is to function properly."