At a hearing on 24 April Hastings Magistrates sentenced the owner of the Castle Street shop Delboys, Lhon Karimi, to 12 weeks imprisonment, suspended for 12 months, after he pleaded guilty to nine offences of selling illegal tobacco and cigarettes and of making alcohol and vape sales to under-age customers. 

East Sussex Trading Standards investigated the premises after what they called a “child test purchaser” was sold a can of cider and an adult a packet of illegal cigarettes in 2023, and another “test” child bought an over-capacity vape in April 2024.

Karimi at first pleaded not guilty to the charges but changed his pleas at the start of his trial last December. All illegal stock was ordered to be forfeited and destroyed.