A COMPANY must pay £12,900 after mislablling Halloween masks as non-flammable.

When Swindon trading standards officials tested the masks supplied by Palmer Agencies, they burned after just two seconds exposure to a flame.

The masks supplied by Tim Palmer's Belfast firm were on sale in Swindon's Giggles party shop in Faringdon Road.

When Palmer appeared at Swindon Magistrates Court, he was found guilty of three charges of giving items a false trades description, fined £3,000 for each and ordered to pay £3,900 in costs.

He was found not guilty of selling a dangerous product, because the masks were clearly labelled as being for adults rather than children.

It was his company's third brush with the law over goods which were a fire risk.

Trading standards team leader Phil Thomas said afterwards: "We are happy with the size of the fines for the trading standards offences.

"It obviously goes to show that magistrates take these offences seriously and that we were right to bring them to court."

The charges were brought after the Trading Standards team surveyed goods being sold in shops throughout Swindon prior to the 2000 Halloween celebrations.

Prosecutor Alan Fuller told the magistrates that Palmer's firm had one previous conviction and a police caution.

On October 2, 1995 the company was fined by West Berkshire magis-trates over witches' hats which burned at an excessive rate.

The hats were sold by a shop in London.

And in late 1993, the firm was cautioned over curly fun wigs which were wrongly labelled non-flammable.

Palmer's solicitor in the latest case, Jeremy Barnett, stressed that Palmer had recalled the goods and relabelled them as soon as the problem was brought to his attention.

Palmer had pleaded not guilty to all four offences during a trial lasting two days and the magistrates considered the evidence for almost four hours before delivering their verdict.

Nobody from Giggles was available for comment.