TWO Southampton truckers were caught up in a gang that netted more than £1.3 million in lorry heists, a court has heard.

In a three-year spree the gang struck at least 12 times across the country by recruiting drivers and other employees from haulage firms to give them inside information, Southampton Crown Court was told.

In some cases thieves, posing as legitimate truckers and armed with tip-offs, simply walked into dockside compounds, picked up lorry keys and paperwork, and drove off.

The diverse list of booty - including toasters, vacuum cleaners, three-piece suites, brandy, whisky, Marks and Spencer's clothes and toiletries, stereos, tyres, and computer monitors - was distributed through a national black market network.

The lorries and trailers were normally abandoned in remote locations after their loads had been switched.

The drivers and inside informers were paid thousands of pounds in used £20 and £10 notes handed over in carrier bags, the court heard.

The scam - which spread from across the South to Liverpool, Manchester, and Essex - was finally uncovered in January last year when an undercover detective, known only as "Robbie", posed as a crooked lorry driver and taped conversations with bosses where they boasted of how much money was to be made.

Detectives from the South East Regional Crime Squad then sprang a trap by setting up Robbie with a lorry and trailer full of spirits which the gang tried to steal, the court was told.

Nicholas Haggan, prosecuting said the two Southampton men - Kevin Sheridan, 33, of Newtown Road, Woolston, and Anthony Barfoot, 55, of Bond Road, Bitterne Park - were "some way down the scale of the conspiracy" but nevertheless were involved.

He said Sheridan, a relief driver working for dock-based haulage firm W Carter Ltd, had admitted in a police interview telling gang leaders of security arrangements at the firm's Solent Road compound.

That was just before a lorry with a load of Sanyo stereo equipment worth £155,000 was taken in August 1996.

Barfoot was "caught red-handed" by police, helping to unload the cargo of wine and spirits at a goods yard in Melksham, Wiltshire, in the sting operation which ultimately spelled the downfall of the gang in January 1998, he said.

Both Sheridan and Barfoot deny charges of conspiracy to steal lorries and their cargo between 1995 and 1998 and separate alternative charges relating to the two alleged incidents.

The court was also told that four other men have pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy to steal. Proceeding

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