A formula for trouble

Shop owner suspected he was handling stolen goods, it was ...

A MAN has admitted buying and selling stolen baby formula from his Corio milk bar, providing further insight into Geelong’s black market trade of the powder.

Almost 30 tins of the milk substitute were found at the Kosciusko Milk Bar, pictured, when six Geelong police officers raided it on August 30.

The shop’s owner, Haochen Hu, 37, appeared in Geelong Magistrates’ Court yesterday, admitting he suspected the tins were stolen when he bought them from various customers.

By selling the tins for $50 each to China, Hu had stock worth almost $1500 in his store, and the court heard his profit margin was between $10 and $30 per tin.

A number of thieves have appeared in Geelong Magistrates’ Court this year for steal- ing baby formula from the region’s supermarkets and pharmacies, often to feed their own drug habits.

Hu’s lawyer said a health scare on China’s domestic baby formula products had increased demand in the world’s most populous country for Australian-made substitutes.

“There is a market for these products in China,” she said.

Married with one child, Hu, from Bell Post Hill, has owned and operated the Kosciusko Ave store for the past seven years.

The court heard his flirtation with black market trad- ing started naively when a man walked in to his store and asked if he’d buy two tins of baby formula off him.

Hu claimed the man told him he’d bought the tins at a pharmacy and wanted to return them but was unable to do so because he’d lost his receipt.

From then on, the man and his associates started visiting the store regularly with more baby formula to sell.

Hu’s lawyer told court her client suspected the tins were stolen but was never told explicitly that they were.

She described the man’s offending as opportunistic rather than pre-planned, and said he was deeply remorseful and ashamed. The police raid was a “harrowing experience and distressing for his family”, the lawyer said.

With no prior convictions, Hu avoided conviction after pleading guilty to handling stolen goods.

Magistrate Peter Reardon put Hu on a one-year good behaviour bond, ordering he pay $300 to the charitable court fund.

“Most people are entitled to at least one opportunity. I’m going to give you that now,” Mr Reardon said.