Ipswich fraudster asks for extra time to repay £100,000 confiscation order

An Ipswich fraudster who is facing two years behind bars if he doesn’t pay a £100,000 confiscation order has asked a court for more time to pay.

Hemen Adalat, of Star Lane, was convicted following a trial last year of selling a car with a false mileage after an investigation by Suffolk Trading Standards officers.

Adalat had advertised a BMW 3 series in Auto Trader and claimed it had done 42,000 miles when it had actually done 142,000 miles. The car was purchased for £7,500.

The buyer subsequently sold the vehicle and its true mileage was discovered when the new owner did a check.

The man who bought the car from Adalat lost £2,000.

Adalat was convicted of two offences of fraud by false representation and three offences of concealing, converting or transferring criminal property and was given a three-month prison sentence suspended for 18 months and ordered to do 120 hours’ unpaid work in the community. He was also ordered to pay £11,142 costs.

In January this year Ipswich Crown Court ordered Adalat to hand over £100,000 under the Proceeds of Crime Act or face two years in prison because he was unable to prove his earnings had come from legitimate business.

The period for payment expired on August 20 and unless the period is extended an enforcement court in Dover could order Adalat to serve all or part of the two-year default jail term.

Yesterday, Adalat’s legal team told Ipswich Crown Court he was asking for more time to pay and the matter was adjourned until September 29 to allow him to provide evidence to show there were exceptional circumstances why this should be done.

Judge John Devaux agreed to a prosecution application that £16,000 from the sale of a Jaguar belonging to Adalat should be transferred to help meet the confiscation order.

Lynne Shirley, for Adalat, said her client, who was also accused of driving test frauds, had been assisting the police and had fled to Canada earlier this year after being seriously assaulted.

“He was told by those who assaulted him he needed to leave the country,” said Miss Shirley.

She said Adalat had been held in an immigration centre in Canada before being returned to the UK on July 21 after an arrest warrant was issued when he failed to attend Croydon Crown Court for a hearing in January.

The 30-year-old was facing charges of fraud and possessing identity documents with improper intentions in relation to driving test frauds and on July 31 he was given a suspended prison sentence and ordered to do 250 hours’ unpaid work.