Crime proceeds settlements will not be confirmed until early next year in the cases of two metal detector enthusiasts jailed over their bid to sell rare Anglo-Saxon coins.

Craig Best, 47, from Bishop Auckland, and 76-year-old Roger Pilling, from Rossendale, in Lancashire, both received 62-month (five years and two months) prison sentences at Durham Crown Court, in May, last year.

It followed their conviction for conspiracy to convert criminal property, by arranging the attempted black-market sale of the high-valued coins, and for possessing criminal property.

Since they were jailed, proceeds of crime proceedings have been taking place to see what assets or finances can be confiscated from the convicted duo.

(Image: Durham Constabulary)

An update in the crime proceeds process was given at the court today (Thursday September 5).

Case prosecutor, Matthew Donkin, said defence counsel for Pilling have indicated that valuation and benefit figures put forward by the Crown are unlikely to be challenged, but there may be a dispute over his available assets.

He said in the case of Best there may be some dispute over the final figures due to what his counsel claim has been “double counting” by the prosecution.

Judge Geoffrey Marson set a date of January 31 for a half-day settlement hearing, but he said all parties must submit their “skeleton arguments” three weeks earlier, by January 10.

The court heard that Pilling’s wife, Samira, may also be an interested party in the proceedings, and if that remains the case, Judge Marson said she should also attend the hearing on January 31.

Judge James Adkin, the, then, Judicial Recorder of Durham, who oversaw the pair’s trial in April last year, said had they succeeded in selling the coins the effect would have been to, “significantly dilute the nation’s historical heritage”.

(Image: Durham Constabulary)

Passing sentence, he told them he was sure the coins were from a larger hoard, unearthed in Herefordshire, in 2015, which was the subject of a previous trial, at Worcester Crown Court.

It resulted in two other metal detectorists being jailed for more than 18 years, in 2019.

The Durham trial heard that Best and Pilling hoped to make potentially hundreds of thousands of pounds from the sale of up to 44 of the 9th Century-minted coins, which should have been declared to the authorities as, “national treasure”.

Best and Pilling were arrested as a result of a police sting when Best attended a pre-arranged meeting at The Royal County Hotel, in Durham, in May 2019, with a sample of three of the coins.

He believed he was meeting an expert who was to authenticate them on behalf of a potential US buyer.

But it was an undercover operation, jointly staged by the North East Regional Organised Crime Unit and the Durham force.

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Officers intervened during the meeting and seized the coins, before arresting Best, while police in Lancashire simultaneously raided Pilling’s home and recovered 41 more coins, arresting him on his subsequent return to the property.

The prosecution stated that being aware of other recoveries of rare coin hoards, both men would have known that under the Treasury Act, of 1996, they should have declared the coins to the authorities as, “treasure”.

Both defendants claimed they were unaware they constituted “treasure” and said they were only trying to have them authenticated, rather than trying to sell them.