Wolverhampton crook behind sham marriages made £42,000

Mohammed Akhtar masterminded the money-making racket, which involved fake love letters and staged wedding photographs to try and convince authorities that the weddings were genuine.

The 29-year-old from Dunstall Road, Wolverhampton, was jailed for five years in May 2014 after pleading guilty to 11 counts of conspiring to facilitate the commission of a breach of UK immigration law by a non-EU person. He has now been ordered to pay more than £10,000 back or face another eight months in jail.

Akhtar used his job at a solicitors to make contact with immigrants from the Indian sub-continent whose visas had expired, and was assisted by mother and son Vera Horvatova and Leon Horvat who recruited 'brides' from Wolverhampton. The authorities only cottoned on after being notified by Wolverhampton Registry Office about a suspicious marriage between an Indian man and Ingrid Munova, a Czech national living in Wolverhampton.

Prosecutor Geoffrey Dann told Wolverhampton Magistrates Court: "He has accepted that he made £42,000. He was involved in 21 sham marriages and made about £2,000 each time.

"He has equity in a house that is registered in the name of him and his brother. The joint equity is worth £12,750. A savings account has £4,398 in it. So the totality of assets available to him are £10,773."

Akhtar was ordered to pay back the £4,398 from his savings account within two weeks, and the £6,375 within three months. If he doesn't pay up he will face another eight months in prison.

Also jailed in May 2014 for charges relating to conspiring to facilitate the commission of a breach of UK immigration law by a non-EU person were Horvat, of Dunstall Road, who was jailed for 32 months, Horvatova, also of Dunstall Road, was jailed for three years and Munova, of Bright Street Wolverhampton, for six months.