A man from Battersea has been jailed for his role in a gang that faked driving tests.

Musa Matluma, 34, of York Road, was jailed for eight months for conspiring to commit fraud by false representation at Blackfriars Crown Court yesterday.

He was part of a group of four people, headed by Dzemail Trstena, 45, from Belgium, that charged provisional licence holders up to £2,500 to sit theory or practical driving tests for them at centres all around the Home Counties and West Midlands.

Matluma, originally from Macedonia, was arrested by investigators from the National Crime Agency and the Metropolitan Police while fraudulently sitting a theory test on June 30, 2014.

Seven provisional licence holders, whose documents were found in the group’s possession, have also been prosecuted.

Investigators believe their main motivation in using impersonators was to bypass the language restriction of taking the test in English or Welsh.

Spencer Barnett from the Organised Crime Partnership said: "These men conspired to make a criminal profit with no regard for the risk that they were helping potentially dangerous and unskilled drivers onto Britain’s roads.

"Trstena was the coordinator, ferrying his fake candidates to test centres around the country and adopting the role of ‘instructor’ as part of the fraud.

"We will never know how many tests they successfully cheated, but they were brazen and persistent in their repeated attempts.

"I have no doubt that they would have kept going had we not stopped them when we did."

Andy Rice, head of counter-fraud and investigations at the Driver and Vehicle Standars Agency, said

: "Impersonators taking tests on behalf of others allow untested and unqualified drivers onto our roads.  

"These unqualified individuals pose a real risk to other road users and pedestrians as they have never been tested to ensure that they meet the minimum standards for driving and are unsafe.”


"This sentence sends out a clear message that those who put road users and the public at risk by cheating the driving test process, will be pursued and prosecuted.”