A man who became a millionaire by illegally selling Viagra-type drugs on the internet used Malta bank accounts to channel his illicitly-earned cash through a network of offshore tax havens.
Martin Simon Hickman, 49, from Ashton under Lyne, made £3.4m profit in four years through several websites, including one in Germany, by cashing in on the booming online trade in prescription drugs.
He has now been jailed for two years.
At Southwark Crown Court he pleaded guilty to money laundering £1.4m and four charges relating to the possession, sale and supply of counterfeit and unlicensed medicines. It bought him a lavish lifestyle including a £500,000 rural home, luxury cars, and a £2.4m riverside Chelsea flat - together with property in Marbella, Spain.
The £3.4m he pocketed was part of a £6m turnover from his company, MSH World Traders. It was investigated by the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Authority (MHRA) for four years. The agency started an inquiry after a tip-off from a GP.
Hickman had channelled the money through accounts in Malta, the Cayman Islands, the Isle of Man and local banks in Ashton under Lyne and Lees in Oldham.
An MHRA test-purchase through the German website yielded a parcel of fake Viagra. The following year an M.E.N reporter was sent Lovegra, a name for the Viagra-type drug Kamagra, which is not licensed for sale in Britain. The authorities had to get an injunction to get the German-hosted site shut down. Hickman was jailed for three months and fined £20,000 for contempt of court.
The court heard in 1998 he was jailed for 10 months for conspiracy to trade in steroids. Hickman has paid about £1m in out-of-court settlement after civil action against him by pharmaceutical giant Pfizer.
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