A HIGHLY sophisticated gang of Mercedes and BMW thieves, including a ringleader from Romford, have been jailed for a total of eight and a half years.

The five men gave stolen motors new identities from vehicles that had been exported to Cyprus.

They kept the best cars for themselves, Southwark Crown Court heard.

Quarban Hussain, 31, from Hathaway Gardens, and his brother Kamran, 24, from East Ham, in east London, rented two sites in Edmonton, east London, and in Tilbury Docks, Essex, where work on the cars was carried out.

They took details of legitimately registered UK cars which had been shipped abroad and used the Vehicle Identification Number to clone them.

Quarban admitted processing 19 cars worth �284,675, while his brother admitted he had cars worth around �265,600.

Among them was a Mercedes CLS350 worth �32,875, stolen from its owner in Romford.

Three other men, Idris Wahid, 26, Ifzal Uddin, 27, and Iqbal Khan, 29, all from Walthamstow, east London, also admitted charges of handling stolen goods.

The group were prosecuted over cars that were processed for re-sale at the site, worth a total of �374,025.

Judge John Price said: “In essence, this was a car-ringing exercise.

“Cars were stolen, and false codes are provided, VIN numbers are changed, and they are put back on the market.”

“Mr Kamran Hussain and Quarban Hussain are regarded as the lieutenants in that there were people further up the chain who are yet to be arrested who are more involved in the planning side.”

Quarban and Kamran were each given 30 months jail for their part in the conspiracy.

Uddin and Wahid admitted to a total of 12 counts of handling stolen goods and were sentenced to two months and 18 months in prison, respectively.

Khan, who carried out manual work on three of the cars, was sentenced to 51 weeks in prison, suspended for six months, 200 hours of unpaid work, and ordered to obey a curfew between 11pm and 6am.

A confiscation hearing will take place next year to try to recover some of the gang’s profits.

Detective Sergeant Pete Ellis, from Scotland Yard’s the Economic and Specialist Crime Command, said: ‘This was a long and complex investigation where our officers, who are experts in vehicle identification, had to examine a large number of vehicles to build up enough evidence to convict this network of criminals.”