A COUPLE who were jailed for employing illegal workers at their Chinese restaurant have been given a further month to pay off a �1million court order.

Phing Woon Pun and his wife Kim Tai Wong, who ran the Temptation Chinese Buffet in Carr Street and the Lucky Star Takeaway in Hawthorn Drive, Ipswich, were ordered to pay a total confiscation order of �1m by a judge last year after they were found guilty of conspiring to breach UK immigration laws and converting criminal property.

Pun, 50, of Penn Close, Capel St Mary, was jailed for six years and was made the subject of a �683,370 confiscation order and his wife was jailed for 30 months and ordered to pay a �322,000 order.

A hearing at Ipswich Crown Court yesterday was told that Pun had so far repaid �181,212 of his order and his wife had repaid �82,633 of her order.

Judge Peter Thompson adjourned the case until June 21 after hearing the couple were in the process of selling their Carr Street premises and arrangements had been made to sell property in Malaysia.

Judge Thompson told Pun that by the next hearing he expected him to have produced �25,000 worth of Rolex watches that had been seen by police officers during a search of the couple’s home, but had not been accounted for since.

In addition to being found guilty of breaching immigration laws and converting criminal property, Pun was also convicted of conspiring to sell goods which infringed trademark and copyright and obtaining a �198,000 money transfer by deception.

The pair were arrested after immigration officers carried out raids at their two restaurants and discovered 20 Chinese and Malaysian illegal immigrants working at the premises.