A pair of master forgers from east London who made more than £1 million supplying fake IDs to high-profile criminals have been jailed.
Bilal Iqbal, 25, and Ummad Ahmed, 32, produced and sold more than 40,000 falsified documents over an eight-year period.
The two men, who are both British citizens, were sentenced to six years each at Snaresbrook Crown Court on Thursday.
However, they will serve half of this sentence on licence, meaning they must adhere to specific conditions and remain under supervision by police.
The convictions follow a National Crime Agency investigation, which revealed Iqbal and Ummad Ahmed were charging £70 for fake driving licences.
They would also charge more for optional extras, such as holographic stickers or raised text, to make the fakes appear more authentic.
Iqbal and Ahmed were found to have laundered their illicit profits through a local window cleaning company.
Their criminal enterprise was uncovered by the NCA following a separate probe into international drug trafficker Eddie Burton.
The Merseyside-based dealer, 23 used a fake ID supplied by Iqbal and Ahmed to travel across Europe and import more than 300kg of Class A drugs into Britain with the help of his girlfriend Sian Banks, 25.
Iqbal and Ahmed were detained on January 21, 2025, hours before they were due to board a flight to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
At the time of his arrest, Iqbal was lugging envelopes containing 19 fake driving licences, with a further 21 more confiscated from his car and home in Ilford, Redbridge,
Items seized from Ahmed’s property in Hornchurch, Havering included a card printer, laminator and £20,000 in cash.
Tackling enablers for criminality is a key pillar in our mission to protect the public
John Turner, NCA senior investigating officer, said: “These men ran an extremely lucrative illegal enterprise and operated as professional enablers at the heart of serious and organised crime.
“These IDs helped high-profile criminals evade law enforcement and operate anonymously.
“They could also be used by offenders involved in organised immigration crime to provide people smuggled into the country with false UK identities.
“Tackling enablers for wider criminality, such as Iqbal and Ahmed, is a key pillar in our mission to protect the public from serious and organised crime.”
