Victims 'mugged off' by vehicle-clocking criminals

Victims who bought cars and vans with clocked mileage say they feel "mugged off" by the fraudsters who wound back a total of 2,000,000 miles off vehicle odometers.

Ryan Regan, Thomas Hamilton and Darren Cradduck, all from Kent, were all given suspended sentences at Canterbury Crown Court on Friday.

Shaun Thomas, 61, a bricklayer from Hastings, unknowingly bought a van from the group which had had nearly 100,000 miles taken off the odometer.

He said: "Everything seemed to be legit, but I got turned over, I feel a bit of a prat."

Clocking is when the total miles travelled displayed on a vehicle's dashboard is tampered with.

The odometer is the device which measures the distance travelled by the vehicle.

By decreasing the mileage on the vehicles, fraudsters can then sell them on for a higher price.

Regan, Hamilton and Cradduck bought 21 high-mileage vehicles at auction and reduced their distance travelled by an average of 90,500 miles each, Kent Trading Standards said.

The largest mileage deduction in one vehicle was 163,000 miles.

Mr Thomas bought a Citroën Dispatch from the dealers.

When he took the van for an MOT a year later, he was contacted by the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) which told him there was a problem with the mileage.

On further investigation by Kent Trading Standards, the total amount clocked was discovered to be nearly 100,000 miles.

Mr Thomas said: "It leaves a sour taste in your mouth really. It had full service history, an MOT on it which was the same as what was on the clock but now we know it wasn't all true.

"I feel a bit of a mug," he added.

The investigation into the group began in 2018 when a victim broke down on the drive to North Yorkshire after purchasing a van in Sandwich.

Kent Trading Standards requested information from online auction sites about the dealers which highlighted 20 different trading names linked to the group, and that the buy and sell mileages did not tally up.

A search warrant was carried out at the unit at the Old Boatyard, Sandwich where fake log books and MOT certificates were found.

Data extracted from the vehicles' electronic control units were also found not to correspond to the mileage displayed on the dashboard.

Kent Trading Standards said it had found evidence relating to 22 victims.

In December, Regan, Hamilton and Cradduck pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud.

Evidence found on phones, emails and bank accounts also found Cradduck was receiving requests from motorists wanting to clock their lease vehicles so they would not be charged extra for going over their mileage allowance, trading standards said.

He charged £50 per car and called it a "haircut".

Kent County Council's barrister said the value of the fraud based on the profit made from the sale of these vehicles amounted to £80,000.

Barrister Alison Lambert told the court documents for 303 vehicles were seized and 98 vehicles' odometers were proven to have been tampered with.

Raghu Malhotra bought a Volkswagen (VW) Golf for nearly £10,000.

The fraudulent sellers did not have the car's service history so Mr Malhotra contacted the main VW dealership.

When he bought the car, the odometer was at 44,000 miles.

He said: "I found out the mileages at the service intervals and they were a lot higher than was on the car."

He sold the car three months later at a loss of £5,000 because of the extra 102,045 miles which had been taken off the odometer by the criminals.

He added: "There's a big financial loss, and there's a sense of 'I should have known better really'."

Clive Phillips, operations manager at Kent Trading Standards, said the investigation was unprecedented in size and scale for Kent County Council.

He said: "Two million miles is shocking, it's serious offending and that's why we prosecuted.

"They were significantly reducing the mileage leaving people out of pocket.

"We suspect they've clocked a lot more than we are able to prove and show to the court."

During sentencing, Judge Edmund Fowler said there had been an "inordinate delay" in the case which he had taken into consideration when sentencing.

Ryan Regan and Thomas Hamilton were given a two-year prison sentence, suspended for two years.

Darren Cradduck was sentenced to 20 months imprisonment, suspended for two years.

All three will have to pay compensation and carry out 200 hours of unpaid work.

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