Tobacco Growers Rue Customs Raids

Source from:  By HELEN MURDOCH - The Press Wednesday, 25 April 2007 04/26/2007

Motueka tobacco grower Laurie Jury has been reunited with 3.8 tonnes of raw tobacco leaf the Customs Service seized from his farm in 2005. Its return yesterday had cost him and his partner more than $30,000 in legal fees and nearly two years of angst while they faced charges of illegally manufacturing and possessing tobacco, he said. Jury, who grew tobacco before the industry closed in Motueka in the mid-1990s, said he was disgusted at the manner in which Customs had acted. He had grown the tobacco in the summer of 2004-05 to sell it to licensed manufacturer Isla Services, of Christchurch. It is legal to grow tobacco in New Zealand, but it must be manufactured on Customs-licensed premises and excise duty paid on the saleable product. Jury said the tobacco had been stored in his sheds to mature when Customs raided his Motueka Valley property in July 2005. On the same day, nearby properties owned by the Brereton family were also raided for illegal tobacco. Bob Brereton is still fighting Customs for the return of his almost one-tonne crop, Jury said. Jury and his partner, Michelle Ward, who was undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer at the time of the raid, each had three charges laid against them by Customs. "They didn't have anything on us and what they did to Michelle was gutting. It's disgusting to know government departments can act like that." An Inland Revenue audit (undertaken at Customs' request) found Jury clean, but he pleaded guilty to one minor charge during his week-long trial in March on the proviso he would have his tobacco returned without appeal. At least one quarter of the raw tobacco had rotted in storage and the remainder would be sold to Isla Services "if I can rekindle the business agreement", he said yesterday. He said he had grown another hectare of tobacco this summer, which would be matured for two years before being sold. Customs had done a huge amount of damage to his family and his business trying to prove, erroneously at taxpayers' expense, he was part of New Zealand's black market tobacco industry, Jury said. "They say illegal tobacco crops are based around Motueka, but there is none here, it all comes in from overseas." Brereton said Customs was spending thousands of taxpayer dollars chasing paltry domestic growers. Customs officers and police seized 984.8 kg of raw leaf and 336kg of cut leaf and waste from his properties in July 2005, he said. The family had been storing the tobacco and selling it at cost to family and friends. They were very casual about it and "everyone in Motueka knew", Brereton said. Sales were not huge. In the four years between harvest and the 2005 raid they sold only 68kg, he said. As a result of the raid, Bob Brereton, his father, Anthony Brereton, and his wife, Andrea, were charged with evading excise duty, manufacturing tobacco without a licence and selling uncustomed tobacco. The family pleaded guilty because they could not afford to defend the charges, and were fined a combined $3000, he said. They also paid $65,880 in excise duty. Enditem