The son of a Sinn Féin MLA has been convicted for his involvement in a £16,000 (about €21,000)fuel fraud.

At Newry Crown Court last week, Fearghal McMullan (33) was sentenced to a one-year prison term, suspended for three years, for his role in evading tax through the attempted transportation of diesel from Northern Ireland to Britain in 2013.

His father is East Antrim MLA Oliver McMullan, who was reelected to Stormont following the Assembly elections earlier this month.

Fearghal McMullan, the director of the now defunct Co Armagh haulage company McMullan International, was convicted along with Seamus McCambridge.

Following an investigation by Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs (HMRC) officers, McCambridge (38), a lorry driver for McMullan International, was stopped at a port in Scotland in May 2013.

Some 25,000 litres of laundered fuel was found in the trailer of the lorry he was driving.

Falsified business records were also seized.

The diesel was reportedly transported in plastic drums, packed into cardboard boxes that were wrapped in cling film in an attempt to avoid detection.

Fearghal McMullan was later arrested at his home in Co Armagh.

It is understood his home was searched and a fake delivery document connected to the fuel seized in Scotland was found.

McCambridge, of Middlepark Avenue, Cushendall, Ballymena, and McMullan, of Seaghan Road, Collone, Co Armagh, were both sentenced to one year in prison, suspended for three years, when they appeared at the same court last Monday.

The men had pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to charges of fraudulent evasion of excise duty.

Steve Tracey, assistant director of the HMRC Fraud Investigation Service, condemned the pair’s behaviour.

“The safe transportation of fuel takes great care,” he said.

“However, fuel fraudsters like McCambridge and McMullan are simply motivated by money, oblivious to the safety of other road users and the environmental damage caused by fuel laundering.

“Anyone with information about this type of activity should contact HMRC on our 24-hour hotline on 0800-595000.”

Reaction

On Sunday, Oliver McMullan could not be contacted to comment on his son’s conviction.

During the last Assembly term, the veteran Sinn Féin representative had asked his party colleague Michelle O’Neill, the then agriculture minister, what the department was doing to combat fuel laundering on the Irish border.

A statement from a Sinn Féin spokesman said: “This matter has been adjudicated on by the courts and two men were handed suspended sentences.

“Fuel laundering is wrong. Not only does it undermine the economy but there are detrimental environmental impacts to the processing of illegal fuel.

“Sinn Féin has been vociferous in our condemnation of illegal fuel laundering and criminality and will continue to be so.”