Three jailed over €23m beer smuggling operation

Three men have been jailed in Germany after customs authorities smashed an illegal operation that had hundreds of truck loads of beer smuggled into the UK to be sold on the black market.

The scam meant that the men avoided paying tax of around €23 million

As reported by The Local, the men maintained the operation for more than a year, sneaking beer into Britain by maintaining the ruse that it was in fact French imported beer that was being sold in Bavaria.

Each week, the men would arrange for 80 trucks carrying the beer to arrive at their headquarters, which was recorded as imported beer from France and had a German tax applied.

Tax on beer is 13 times higher in the UK than in Germany, which meant that the men were able to make a good profit on beer smuggled into the country.

These bottles would then be taken to a shipping company nearby to be smuggled into the UK.

German customs officials became suspicious as to how the company was selling 80 truck loads of foreign beer in Bavaria every week, especially given the huge amount of domestic breweries in the area.

The authorities raided the operation last December and arrested the men, and on Wednesday this week a court handed down three jail sentences ranging between two years, and three years and three months.

It was estimated that the operation had enabled the smugglers to avoid €23 million in tax (£19.4m).