Drug dealer’s £50k car sold for £10k to help victims of crime
A DRUG dealer’s £50,000 Range Rover has been sold for just a FIFTH of its cost at a government auction.
Shiraz Sharif and his wife Salina, from Levenshulme, were sentenced for drugs and money-laundering offences last year.
They claimed £40,000 in child tax credits while making an estimated £500,000 selling ecstasy and cannabis over six years, a court heard.
The Sharifs lived a luxury lifestyle, going on five-star holidays, paying private school fees for their three children and buying flash cars.
But their world came crashing down when police raided the family home in 2014 and found drugs stashed in the attic.
Shiraz, 45, fled to Pakistan before his trial – leaving his wife to face the music alone – but was jailed for more than four years in his absence. He remains on the run. Salina Sharif was found guilty of money laundering and jailed for 30 months.
Now the government has sold one of their cars at an auction in Newport, Wales, to raise money for the victims of crime. The 2012 Range Rover Vogue, purchased new for £51,000, was sold to a group of young men at the auction for £10,250.
Tucked away on an industrial estate, bargain-hunters came out in the hope of picking up goods seized from criminals for a fraction of their price. The unreserved government sale at Wilsons Auctions saw more than 80 items go under the hammer.
Bidders had the chance to purchase a range of high-end goods. One of the lots was even a designer balaclava worth more than £140.
Sitting in the front row, eagerly watching each lot appear on the large TV screen behind the auctioneers, Matt Stanton regularly bids on items. The father-of-two from Newport often attends the government auctions, but has no idea what he’ll come away with. At the latest auction, the managing director picked up a 1970s boat for £1,600.
Matt said: “It doesn’t bother me that a criminal once owned the items. It was bought through illegitimate means and now it’s being bought back legitimately to help the victims.”
In total the auction raised more than £50,000.
Unreserved government auctions are held monthly at Wilsons Auctions in Newport. See www.wilsonsauctions. com