No case to answer on importing luxury car

Press, 30 September 1986, Page 4

No case to answer on importing luxury car

The Customs Department, which earlier this year successfully prosecuted a young Christchurch woman over the importation of a luxury car, said by the department to have been worth $85,000 in New Zealand, filed yesterday in an associated prosecution against her father. After the completion of prosecution evidence in the defended hearing in the District Court yesterday, Judge Erber upheld defence submission that there was no case for George Andrew Logan, aged 49, a company director, to answer. The Judge dismissed the charge against Logan that between August I and October 17, 1984 he was knowingly concerned in landing in New Zealand a BMW 525 car when no licence for importation had been granted. The charge arose from the department’s contention that Logan and his daughter had devised a scheme, or “scam,” whereby the car was purchased in Munich in the name of Miss Logan and that she fulfilled the six months overseas ownership requirement, but that the car was intended for Logan after being imported into New Zealand. The defendant’s daughter, Amanda Johan Logan, aged 24, had been convicted and fined $250 in June on each charge of supplying false information in an application to

import the car, by saying it was her car, for her own use, when it was to be owned and used by her father; and of landing the car in New Zealand when no licence had been granted for importation. The car was subject to mandatory forfeiture to the Crown, upon Miss Logan’s conviction. Mr D. J. L. Saunders appeared for the department yesterday. Mr P. G. S. Penlington, Q.C., and Miss C. Risk, appeared for Logan. The department had contended that Miss Logan did not personally own the car; and that what took place was a scam designed to show she owned and used the vehicle. The department relied on Logan having to have naa to own the car for six months out of New Zealand before importing it — but did not fulfil this qualification, Mr Saunders said. Prosecution evidence was that the department became suspicious over the application to import the car because of factors including the age of the applicant and the value of the vehicle. Inquiries and interviews established that Logan had transferred $19,000 into a bank account in England. He had sold a BMW car he had owned since 1982, shortly before travelling overseas, where he was associated in the purchase

of the car in Munich.

Logan said when interviewed that he had lent his daughter the money for the car, but that it belonged to her. Official papers relating to the car’s purchase showed it to be in Miss Logan’s name. Mr Penlington, submitting that there was no case established against Logan, said all official documentation showed the car to be Miss Logan’s; Logan had advanced substantial funds for its purchase as a loan to his daughter, and Logan had asserted that it belonged to his daughter.

Logan had told an interviewing officer that he had lent his daughter the money for the car, which was a way for her to

recover the costs of her overseas holiday by eventually selling the car in New Zealand.

Logan had gone overseas to see his daughter and on a business trip, with a business partner.

He had been involved in arrangements for the car’s importation, through a Christchurch dealer, because servicing and guarantee provisions on the vehicle would then apply.

The Judge said the competing claims of the prosecution and defence were in balance. He could not determine whether or not he might or might not convict if there was no other evidence. Because of this doubt in the case, the charge had to be dismissed.