[Sources: BBC News, 24 November 1999; The Glascow Herald, 24 November 1999, 25 November 1999, 16 December 1999]

Towards the end of 1999 two counterfeiters were found guilty at Hamilton Sheriff's Court of making one-pound counterfeit coins. They were sentenced to three years and one year in prison respectively. The counterfeiter sentenced to three years had been previously sentenced nine years in prison for the armed abduction of his wife.

After a tip-off Police had raided a farm at Bellshill, North Lanarkshire, that is south-east of Glasgow. At the farm they found 2,000 completed counterfeit one-pound coins and 4,000 counterfeits awaiting electro-plating. They also found on the farm, moulds and a "machine for making fake coins". The reports were unclear as to whether any counterfeits had been distributed and the precise manufacturing process used.

Comment

The use of moulds and the need to electro-plate the counterfeits points towards the manufacture of white metal counterfeits. As no mention was made of a melting facility it must be assumed that the "machine" was a relatively sophisticated, combined melting-casting machine. This presumed set-up would probably have had the capability to produce reasonable copies.

[Earlier in this year,1999, two other Glasgow men were convicted of manufacturing counterfeit one-pound coins.]

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