{"id":608679,"date":"2025-12-03T02:52:14","date_gmt":"2025-12-03T02:52:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/608679\/"},"modified":"2025-12-03T02:52:14","modified_gmt":"2025-12-03T02:52:14","slug":"birmingham-gang-convicted-over-500k-illegal-tobacco-factory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/608679\/","title":{"rendered":"Birmingham gang convicted over \u00a3500k illegal tobacco factory"},"content":{"rendered":"

Four people have been convicted after police stormed an illegal ‘tobacco factory’\"TopTop row left to right – Honpeng Yang, Mei Yun Wang. Bottom row: Xing Cai Lin, Zheming Han(Image: West Midlands Police)<\/p>\n

A gang of four have been convicted over a \u00a3500,000 illegal ‘tobacco factory’ in Birmingham<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Detectives launched an investigation after stopping a car in the Southside area of the city in May.<\/p>\n

Inside, officers found several weapons including a baseball bat, wooden club, metal bar and a knuckle duster.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: <\/a><\/strong>Birmingham Airport probe after lift carrying airline crew drops to floor below<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Further enquiries led detectives to an address in Perry Barr<\/a> where they found more than 400kg of hand rolled tobacco worth \u00a3177,000.<\/p>\n

They also seized over 4,500 illicit cigarettes, along with \u00a333,000 in cash.<\/p>\n

The address was effectively being operated as an illegal tobacco factory, police said.<\/p>\n

\"SomeSome of the tobacco seized (Image: West Midlands Police )<\/p>\n

Four people at the address – Mei Yun Wang, Honpeng Yang, Zheming Han, and Xing Cai Lin \u2013 were arrested during the raid.<\/p>\n

Detectives later found two storage units in Aston and Walsall<\/a> with more tobacco worth approximately \u00a3275,000 stuffed inside.<\/p>\n

In total, tobacco worth just over \u00a3450,000 was seized during the raids alongside \u00a332,900 in cash.<\/p>\n

Detectives soon realised that the Walsall container was registered to 45-year-old Wang.<\/p>\n

The criminal – along with Yang, 46, Han, 23, and 50-year-old Lin – were subsequently charged with conspiracy to defraud, conspiracy to cheat the public revenue and money laundering.<\/p>\n

The gang, all of Nash Square, denied the charges but were found guilty following a trial at Birmingham Crown Court<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"TopTop row left to right – Honpeng Yang, Mei Yun Wang. Bottom row: Xing Cai Lin, Zheming Han(Image: West Midlands Police)<\/p>\n

They were also found guilty of conspiring to defrauding Japan tobacco group. Wang and Lin were found guilty of conspiring to cheat the public revenue.<\/p>\n

Detective Inspector Tom Lyons of West Midlands Police said: \u201cThe value of cash and illegal goods seized shows the financial gain made by criminals at the expense of law-abiding citizens, which is something we’ll keep cracking down on.”<\/p>\n

Detective Constable Amy Sheldon-Wilson added: “This outcome should reassure the public that we are taking firm and proactive action against organised crime.<\/p>\n

“Our investigation uncovered two defendants who defrauded the public revenue of an estimated four million pounds and spent decades evading law enforcement while remaining unlawfully in the UK.”<\/p>\n

David Broadbent, Operational Lead at HMRC\u2019s Fraud Investigation Service, said: “The tobacco produced at illegal factories like this undermine legitimate retailers, funds wider organised crime, and harms public health.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe weapons and cash seized by our West Midlands Police<\/a> partners shows the link between tobacco fraud and other serious and organised criminality that harms our communities.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Four people have been convicted after police stormed an illegal ‘tobacco factory’Top row left to right – Honpeng…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":608680,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7820],"tags":[855,748,393,4884,15267,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-608679","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-birmingham","8":"tag-birmingham","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-perry-barr","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115653374882586761","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/608679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=608679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/608679\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/608680"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=608679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=608679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=608679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}