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Former Asian Network presenter guilty of theft

A former BBC Asian Network DJ was found guilty of theft last week.

Anjum Rafiq presented the lunch-time show between 2004 and 2005.

Rafiq had pleaded not guilty to 10 charges of receiving stolen property.

But it took a jury at Warwick Crown Court just two hours to find him guilty of nine of the charges, on Friday (23).

The 33-year-old was granted bail until sentencing, which will take place in the week commencing 17th July.

After the hearing, a BBC Asian Network spokesman said: ���We have no comment to make. He was a freelance member and not on a permanent contract. So he wasn�۪t really a significant part of the team.�۝

Police had raided Rafiq�۪s home at Warwick Road, Solihull, where he lives with his wife and children, last year and found two plasma screens stolen from Birmingham University in January 2005, five flat-screen monitors and a large amount of computer equipment, including some from Solihull Council.

During the hearing, prosecutor Simon Phillips said: ���The accusation is that on various dates up until 12th February, 2005, he handled stolen goods, in the main computers and the like, knowing and believing them to be stolen.�۝

Mr Phillips added: ���The police seized hundreds of items and in due course, 28 of those items were discovered to be stolen goods. There is no dispute that all of the items are stolen goods. The only issue is whether when Rafiq took them into his possession he knew or believed they were stolen.�۝

He said that the DJ had a business of buying and selling computers on the side and the charges related to burglaries and theft committed between 2002 and January 2005.

Rafiq was arrested when he went to the police station two weeks after the raid with a written statement saying he knew nothing about the computers being stolen and had bought them in good faith. But he declined to answer specific questions which investigating officers put to him.

He claimed in court that he had bought the equipment mainly from traders and at trade fairs, getting invoices for most of them. He claimed not to have suspected they were stolen.

Judge Christopher Hodson told him as he adjourned the case for sentencing: ���There is no promise to you as to what the sentence will be.�۝