Fashion shop sting uncovers fake goods
A STRANGEWAYS company has been caught putting fake Mulberry, Prada, Michael Kors, Vivienne Westwood and Chanel badges on handbags.
Manchester council trading standards officers discovered the bogus goods during visits to Yoko’s Fashions, on Derby Street, in 2016. In March that year, officers found a manufacturing ‘plant’ being used to make and distribute fake handbags, purses and jewellery.
They also found a back room with counterfeit badges and logos ready to be put on bogus goods.
Fake Michael Kors purses were found next to equipment for applying labels.
Counterfeit Cartier bangles, Hermes bracelets and Bulgari earrings were also found.
More than 5,000 items were seized during a series of visits.
Liang Fang, the company secretary, admitted 17 offences under the Trade Marks Act at Manchester magistrates’ court.
Three of the offences related to the unauthorised application of a registered trademark to goods, while the remaining counts related to possession of goods bearing unauthorised trademarks.
Fang, 38, of Matisse Way, Salford, was sentenced to 140 hours unpaid work and ordered to pay £2,020 in costs and an £85 victim surcharge.
Yoko Trading Limited was fined £3,400 and ordered to pay £2,020 in costs.
The council’s boss, Nigel Murphy, said: “The sale and distribution of counterfeit goods may seem like a victimless crime, but it can have very serious consequences. Low-quality fake goods may not meet safety standards and put the public at risk, their sale hurts legitimate businesses, and in the worst cases the proceeds of this trade fund other crime.”
Graham Mogg, intelligence coordinator at the Anti-Counterfeiting Group (ACG), said: “The wholesale distribution of counterfeit goods undermines legitimate trade, places consumers at risk and takes money from the public purse.”