Three shops and a residential property on a busy town centre road have been shut by police after officers seized illegal vapes, tobacco and alcohol worth more than £55,000.

Interim closure orders are currently in place on Kubis Polski Sklep, Istanbul Market, Romanian and Polish Shop, and house number 145 on Manchester Road following a series of warrants carried out by police and HMRC and Trading Standards teams at the addresses on Tuesday afternoon.

Wiltshire Police has applied to Swindon Magistrates Court for permission to enforce a three-month closure order which would come into effect after the temporary orders end on Tuesday night.

These orders prevent any people from entering the properties so they’re not able to sell any more illegal items and continue to pose a risk to public health.

PC Stacy McGarry, who is part of the Broadgreen policing team, told the court: “Our concern is that these illegal items are a catalyst for antisocial behaviour.

“This trade by various organised crime gangs on a national scale is having a huge impact on the local community.

“It’s taking away legitimate trade from businesses. [These closure orders] will affect the staff and their income, and we don’t want to take away people’s jobs and livelihood.

“However, we have to weigh that up with how much this is impacting Broadgreen.

“All these businesses are interlinked in some way, there is so much intelligence coming through [about them], we had to provide so much information to the court to obtain the warrants.

“Antisocial behaviour brings potentially undesirable persons to the area. People were trying to come to buy illicit material from the stores after we had carried out the warrants.”

Kubus Polski Sklep owner, Towana Abdullah, is currently in Turkey for knee surgery. In his absence, the court heard representations from a friend before approving the three-month closure order.

The friend said: “The shop has never had any issues, they always served the people nicely in the area.

“Many shops in the area are making trouble – there is a van coming around bringing Rizla and Coca-Cola. When [staff] took from the van, there are vapes – some are legal and some are not legal.

“[Staff] took legal and illegal [vapes] together, a mistake has happened.

“[Mr Abdullah] has never had any problems but because he was away when the van man sold stuff, the mistakes happened.”

Ejaz Ahmed lives at the residential property and, though he did not appear in court, a three-month closure order was approved (with exceptions for his family) after police found around 30,000 cigarettes and around 15kg of tobacco in a locked cupboard in his home.

The other two defendants - Romanian and Polish Shop owner Soran Karim and Istanbul Market boss Awder Mahmood - have sought legal advice and will make their case at Swindon Magistrates Court on Tuesday morning before the court decides whether to enforce longer closure orders.

PC McGarry added that officers found around 300 vapes worth up to £2,000 in Mr Mahmood's store and two packets of illicit cigarettes in one of the two arrested suspect’s pockets.

The warrants formed part of Wiltshire Police’s Clear Hold Build work on making the area safer for residents and business owners.

Some of the illegal vapes were advertised as containing more than 15,000 puffs, despite the puff limit for disposable vapes being 600.

Five men were arrested on suspicion of breaching section 92 of the Trade Marks Act 1994 and have since been released on bail under investigation.

PC Butwell from the Central South NPT said: “If you have any information regarding ongoing illegal activity, please pass it on to police either by calling 101 or contacting Crimestoppers anonymously so that action can be taken.”

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