A Kenton shop owner who has previously breached the terms of his alcohol licence THREE times has been fined for selling illicit cigarettes and chewing tobacco.

Willesden Magistrates Court heard Chandrasegaram Satheeswaran sold the foreign goods, which failed to carry mandatory health warnings, from his shop Sathees Food & Wine in Streatfield Road.

The shopkeeper was caught after officers from Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs and trading standards visited his store where they seized 34 packets of cigarettes and 374 pouches of chewing tobacco.

They also confiscated more than 2,000 litres of alcohol hidden under a counter that were all incorrectly labelled and had no duty paid.

Satheeswaran blamed a mystery supplier called ‘Rajesh’ but admitted breaking the law.

He was convicted of two counts of failing to display the correct health warnings on the cigarette packets and failing to correctly display a notice in the shop prohibiting the sale of tobacco to anyone below 18 years of age.

Satheeswaran was fined a total of £3,210.

He has a previous conviction for selling alcohol to an underage child and has been cautioned for selling booze outside of his licensing hours and allowing a customer to drink on the premises.

Simon Legg, regulatory services manager for trading standards, said: “The law states that warnings must appear on tobacco products to make it absolutely clear to users of the serious harm they can cause.

“Business owners who think that they can get away selling tobacco products that do not comply with the law by hiding them from view but supplying these products from behind the counter are wrong.”