Secret past of passport thief

A HATHERSHAW courier helped stage a fake raid of blank passports worth up to £2.5 million only two years after hundreds of travel documents went missing while in his care.

Alan Burke, of Hathershaw Lane, was the driver’s mate when a parcel containing 900 passports disappeared en-route from Chadderton to the Foreign Office in 2006. They were later traced in Pakistan.

The 49-year-old was also the driver’s mate when more than 3,650 passports and 8,100 visas from a Chadderton printworks were taken last July during a sham robbery, Manchester Crown Court was told.

The Foreign Office were told about the 2006 incident but no further detailed security checks were conducted.

Burke, who has a string of previous convictions, continued to deliver sensitive documents up until the fake raid on the morning of July 28, 2008.

He failed to disclose past convictions when applying for a job at Knutsford-based couriers Sameday and also lied about his past on a Government security clearance form.

Burke confessed to being the “inside man” ahead of a trial of two men also accused of conspiring to steal passports and visas.

Van driver Stephen Shaw (57), of Droylsden, and Mubasher Iqbal (22), of Oldham, were cleared of the offence.

The court was told that members of the public saw a gang drive off in the van — with Burke inside — when Mr Shaw went into a newsagent and left the van unlocked with the keys inside.

Burke told police the raiders smashed his head twice into the dashboard before making off with their haul but he had no obvious injuries and did not report the incident for 45 minutes.

During the trial, Mohammed Khan (53), of Werneth, Mohammed Shanawaz (23), of Chadderton, Jawad Karim (18), of Oldham, and Mohammed Fiaz (34), of Stretford, all pleaded guilty to conspiracy to dishonestly receiving stolen goods.

In January, officers from the Serious Organised Crime Agency and Greater Manchester Police recovered 2,200 of the stolen passports and 3,054 of the visas following a surveillance operation on the M62.

A few days later, a further 600 passports were discovered under a suspended ceiling at the Moston Curry House in Moston Lane which, the prosecution said, Khan had connections with.

Burke will be sentenced on October 23.