Three jailed after police smash forgery plot

Gang produced forged ID documents

A GANG of forgers who supplied criminal networks with false identity documents have been jailed for a total of 16 years.

Deividas Laucka, 28, of Benson Avenue, East Ham, and Tadas Baltakis, and Mindaugas Banys, both aged 27 and from Ilford, Essex, had pleaded guilty at Wood Green Crown Court to conspiracy to manufacture identity documents.

They were arrested earlier this year following a four-month investigation by officers from Operation Maxim, part of the Metropolitan Police Service’s Human Exploitation and Organised Crime Command.

When police swooped on an address in Spurway Parade, Gants Hill they found machinery and equipment used to produce counterfeit identity documents. It also contained a number of counterfeit Lithuanian ID cards and driving licences which were being manufactured to order for �250 per document.

Det Insp Clive Strong of Operation Maxim said: “This was an organised criminal network that created a large number of forged documents in order to supply organised criminals from Eastern Europe and give them some form of legitimacy.”

Laucka and Banys got five years and Baltakis received a six year sentence.