Andronicos Sideras 'secretly mixed horsemeat with beef'
Andronicos Sideras, 55, (pictured today) was allegedly part of a ring of dodgy dealers who conspired to sell 'horsebeef' to supermarkets
A businessman mixed horsemeat with beef and sold it to supermarkets across Britain over eight months in a fraud plot 'motivated by greed', a court heard today.
Andronicos Sideras, 55, was allegedly part of a ring of dodgy dealers who conspired to sell the contaminated 'horsebeef' concoction between January and November 2012.
Ulkrik Nielsen, 58, of Denmark, and his right hand man Alex Beech, 44, of Hull, admitted a single count each of conspiring to defraud last year.
Horsemeat was mixed with raw minced meat and sold to unsuspecting supermarkets and caterers for 85p a kilo more as beef then used in burgers and ready meals.
But Sideras denied any involve ment in the scam and insists he has no idea how horsemeat could have ended up in the consignments he sold from his North London business.
Prosecutor Jonathan Polnay said: 'This case is about lying to people and deceiving people so as to make money - or, to be precise, for people to make more money.
'Like most, if not all, offences of dishonesty, it was motivated by greed.
'It was apparent that for the fraud to work, it needed someone to carry out the physical mixing of the meats.
'It needed someone to make them look genuine - that key role was taken by Mr Sideras.
'There is no dispute that this fraud was going on - the sole question you are going to need to decide is whether Mr Sideras was involved in it.'
Mr Polnay, who described the meat hybrid 'horsebeef', explained that Nielsen and Be ech ran a Danish company called FlexiFoods which bought meat from suppliers across Europe.
Investigators seized samples from Dinos & Sons food factory at the Millmead Industrial Estate in Tottenham, North London
They then had the horsemeat delivered to Sideras' Tottenham-based meat company and sausage manufacturer, Dino's and Sons, where it would be mixed in with beef, packaged and labelled.
The defendant then sold the 'horsebeef' on to McAdams Food Products based in the Republic of Ireland, a company run by Martin McAdams.
McAdams would then sell the meat on to large production companies which supply many of well-known stores.
While a kilogram of beef sold for about Euro 3 (£2.60) in 2012, horsemeat was just Euro 2 (£1.75) per kilogram.
Mr Polnay said three separate consignments of horsemeat 'openly sold and therefore labelled as horsemeat' were sent to Dinos & So ns on June 7, October 19 and October 29 2012.
The shipments amounted to 30,000kg of the meat, the jury was told.
Mr Polnay said: 'I'm not saying that's an offence - it's what happened to it afterwards.'
He alleged that Dinos & Sons were paid a packing cost, which they 'charmingly described as a "sundry charge"' in their invoice, for mixing separate loads of beef and horsemeat.
He said the company charged more for handling 'mixed horsebeef' than pure beef because 'it was a dodgy load that requires more effort'.Â
The contamination of beef and other meats with horsemeat came to light in 2013, with major supermarket chains such as Tesco, Asda and the Co-op all affected by the scandal.
A joint probe carried out by City of London Police, the Food Standards Agency and the CPS has taken just over three years to complete.
The FSA instructed more than 2,500 tests to be carried out in Britain as a result of scandal, which found some products contained up to 100% horsemeat.
Sideras, of Friars Walk, Southgate, north London, denies one count of conspiracy to defraud.
The trial continues.
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