MARBELLA CLUB

Martin Hickman, 49, of Marbella, made £6m profit over four years selling fake and unlicensed Viagra-like prescription drugs. He was jailed for three months in 2007 for failing to close the websites, but just weeks later the M.E.N revealed how he was continuing to trade from behind bars.

The cash funded a lavish lifestyle including a £500,000 country home, a £2.4m Chelsea flat and a home in Marbella.
His Range Rover had a personalised number plate with his initials on and his Bentley had the number plate 'L13 RGE'.

Between 2003 and 2007 Hickman, a former businessman who was made bankrupt in 1998 after being jailed for 10 months for conspiracy to trade in steroids, pocketed £3.4m himself running the enterprise from his farmhouse in Lily Lanes, Ashton under Lyne. He later moved his factory to a nearby office above a shop in Market Avenue. But experts say he was playing 'Russian roulette' with his customers' health. He was caught out selling the fake and unlicensed drugs on his MSH World Traders website after a tip-off triggered a four-year probe by the government department Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).
Hickman was sentenced to three months in jail and fined £20,000 for contempt of court in April 2007 after he became the first retailer in Britain to be convicted of failing to abide by a High Court injunction to close the illegal websites.
But within days of going to jail, the M.E.N ordered Kamagra tablets - a generic and cheaper version of Viagra - from his company's website. investigator was sent a batch of 'Lovegra' tablets, which is another name for Kamagra. We bought eight tablets and were given another eight 'free' at a total cost of £32 plus £5 postage and packaging. Hickman's website offered a wide range of 'erectile dysfunction' medication and boasted there were no prescription, consultation or administration charges. It is believed that most of the medicines he sold were produced in India.
The website offered to supply a maximum of three months' medication in one order.Experts say that if the drugs are taken without an initial assessment by a GP, users run the risk of suffering serious side effects - including a heart attack.
Hickman is due to be sentenced today (Monday June 8th) at Southwark Crown Court in London after pleading guilty to six charges of selling and supplying counterfeit and unlicensed medicines and money laundering the sum of £1.4m. The M.E.N test purchase was one of the offences Hickman pleaded guilty to. He has already paid about £1m in an out of court settlement after civil action against him by pharmaceutical giant Pfizer. A MHRA spokesman said: "There is a risk to public health because when you buy these products via the internet you do not know where they have been manufactured, how they have been stored and what the true content of the medicines are. "Tablets could have the correct basic ingredient but also be contaminated with other substances. "Prescription drugs have significant risks and possible adverse affects if used improperly - without patient's first having a consultation with their GP." Mick Deats, MHRA Head of Enforcement, said: "We have people with no medical qualification whatsoever running websites and running multi-million pounds businesses. "It is a really risky practice to turn to the internet for your medicines. People often use the internet to buy these drugs because they are too embarrassed to go to their doctor or because they wouldn't be prescribed them. And if something goes wrong that could mean they are more reluctant to seek treatment."
MHRA officers did a test purchase from his MSH website and officers raided his home.
They found various erectile dysfunction drugs plus orders, cash, cheques and customer lists. Hickman was interviewed in August and December 2005 but said he was just running a call centre and doing nothing illegal. His website at the time was registered in Germany with an internet service provider - outside the MHRA jurisdiction. But in March 2006 the agency did another test purchase and bought a multi-pack of drugs which included counterfeit Viagra - which is made under licence by Pfizer. A High Court injunction was issued in September 2006 ordering him to shut down the websites but he failed to do so and was jailed in April 2007.
The following month the M.E.N investigated Hickman and made the test purchase.
In August 2007 Hickman's assets were restrained under the Proceeds of Crime Act - including bank accounts, his house, and cars. And the MHRA continued to pursue him because he continued to trade. In January 2008 he appeared in court at the City of London Magistrates Court and was committed to Crown Court in April. 2008. He pleaded guilty to six charges in March this year.

Guardia Civil arrested a 32-year-old Albox resident for allegedly breaking into a house by forcing open the front door. When officers were called out for a possible burglary in progress they arrived at the home to find the front door open, showing clear signs of having been forced. Once inside, officers found three people, two men and a woman. One of them – who appeared to be drunk – was man-handling a woman trying to convince her to leave with him. The man was her ex-partner.It turns out that the when the drunk man was refused entry to the couple’s home, he kicked the door open. He was remanded in custody and charged with breaking and entering.

Karim Pascal Reguig, also known as Karim el Grande, Pascal ‘le Turbulant’ or ‘The Turbulent’, is well-known to the police as a key French-Algerian organised crime member based on the Costa del Sol. He has allegedly been involved in a war between French-Algerian crime organizations that over the past 12 years has claimed the life of 20 people on both sides.A few months ago he almost died after someone threw a broken bottle at him, causing a deep gash in his neck during a massive brawl which broke out in a Marbella nightclub. Eleven years ago he dodged death after he was delayed leaving an Estepona sauna where two hitmen where waiting outside to kill him.
The short-tempered 44-year-old has a criminal record in France dating back to 1994 for being the alleged leader behind an armed robbery in Paris. In 1999 he was arrested for assaulting an officer, document forgery and drug trafficking. In 2003 he was again arrested in Italy in the New Palma police operation that effectively dismantled a drug trafficking network and resulted in the seizure of 100 kilograms of cocaine. However, he managed to walk free due to a legal technicality. The authorities confirm that they have known since January this year that the alleged criminal had returned to the Costa del Sol where he was linked to money laundering and the control of various late night venues in Marbella.The dispute between French crime organizations on the Costa del Sol dates back to October 5, 1996 in Marbella when an alleged mafia don, Jean Pierre Grangeon and his wife Catherine Isabelle Castagna were riddled with up to 40 AK-47 bullets by three masked gunmen dressed in black at the Las Lomas villa.During the three weeks following the double murder, the police arrested several people and searched a number of homes. One of these was the home of Nordine Benali, ‘The Flea’, a French-Algerian that had hid one of the bullet casings used in the murder. ‘The Flea’ managed to escape capture.On October 5, 1997, on the first anniversary of Grangeon and his wife’s murder, Kamel Berkani, Sumo and his friend Benallel Belkacem were critically injured in an ambush as they left the Cesar Palace located at El Paraiso Urbanization in Estepona. At the time, his friend Reguig was inside the sauna. Police think that this was what saved his life. The hit was believed to be a revenge attack for the double murder a year earlier. After the shooting, Reguig left Spain to spend time in Italy and France.On December 17, 1999 the 39-year-old Algerian, Djamel Benali, was gunned down in Fuengirola. The hit men called him on the intercom at his Avenida Romeria del Rocio apartment. When he went down one of the two men emptied the magazine of a pistol on Benali, killing him. Benali was the brother of Nordine Benali, ‘The Flea’.The Flea was killed on October 5, 2001, coinciding with the fifth anniversary of the Grangeon murders. He was shot as he walked down Calle Tortola accompanied by two family members in Los Pajaritos neighbourhood of Sevilla. Two men got out of a car, shot him and sped off. The 47-year-old victim sustained three bullet wounds that killed him. The authorities put the incident down to a simple revenge attack between criminals. He had been extradited to France the year before where at the time of his death; he was awaiting a trial for murder.The Grangeon murders triggered a tit-for-tat killing spree between French-Algerian gangs based in Spain that has so far claimed 20 lives in Spain and France. These French-Algerian mafia organizations are linked to large scale drug trade and high class prostitution on the Costa del Sol.