england - Blog - Gangsters Inc. - www.gangstersinc.org
2024-03-19T12:10:02Z
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/feed/tag/england
Gangs of London
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangs-of-london
2023-11-12T15:18:33.000Z
2023-11-12T15:18:33.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/12290527682?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By Thom L. Jones for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>He was a really old man when he died, a one-time mob boss of London’s Little Italy. Sometimes he was called “The General of Clerkenwell.” In a life that long, there must be a richness, a flavor of spice that carries his endeavors through decades of time unlawfully extant. A thousand memories of people and places, good and bad. Heavy on the bad.</p>
<p>Bert Rossi was part of the gangs of London which had existed for hundreds of years, long before the gangs of New York strode the streets of Manhattan Island. Clerkenwell, an ancient London parish, has been around since the 12th century, in the north-eastern corner of the central city.</p>
<p>Tucked into a corner of Clerkenwell is Saffron Hill, which grew to be known as <em>Il Quartiere</em>, the Italian Quarter. The estate of Saffron Hill was where people, hundreds of years ago. grew saffron, the most expensive spice in the world. By 1922, it had a reputation as squalid and the home of paupers, thieves and pickpockets.</p>
<p>The narrow, muddy, garbage littered streets were inspiration for Charles Dickens in his famous novel, <em>Oliver Twist</em>, using the Hill as the location of Fagin's Den.</p>
<p>The area attracted Italian immigrants, and by 1854, there were over 2000 living in this part of London, although they had been settling here as early as the middle of the 18th century. Joseph Grimaldi, one of the most famous actors and comedians of Regency England, was born here in this area in 1778.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12290520253,RESIZE_180x180{{/staticFileLink}}" width="110" alt="12290520253?profile=RESIZE_180x180" /></a>Roberto Umberto Rossi (right) comes into the world on the first day of November, in 1922, in Saffron Hill. His parents, Rosa and Michele, had moved to London from Italy following the end of World War One. His father, allegedly an ice-cream vendor, was less than successful at plying his trade and Rossi grows up in a rented house shared by three families. It’s claimed the first thing he remembers thieving is a turkey for the family’s Xmas diner.</p>
<p>Bert and his family and all his neighbors were what was once described as 'those vast, miserable, unmanageable masses of sunken people'.</p>
<p>As he moves through childhood, he joins the local street mobs and earned the nicknames “Battles”, which was the way the boys in the streets would hear his mother calling out “Berto” to drag him home at the end of the day. The young hooligans from Sicily bring their own version of street thuggery to the arena, calling themselves <em>scassapagghiara</em>, small-time thieves.</p>
<p>Rossi’s mother tries to find him employment in the majestic Savoy Hotel in London’s West-End when it was obvious that he was outgrowing school, but the son was channeling his energies in a different direction.</p>
<p>One involving the gangs of London.</p>
<p>As Bert was entering the world, gangs were fighting for control across the streets of London, and two of the biggest and most ferocious were Italians.</p>
<p>The Sabinis and Cortesi were highly visible mobs specializing in racecourse protection rackets, extortion, organized theft, as well as owning and controlling nightclubs and drinking dens across parts of the city. At their peak, the Sabini brothers, of at least four, led by Charles known as Darby, had as many as a hundred members in their gang and like all criminal groups, they not only fought the law but more often each other.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-left" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12290520271,RESIZE_180x180{{/staticFileLink}}" width="98" alt="12290520271?profile=RESIZE_180x180" /></a>Recent research shows that there never was a Charles. This was, in fact, the eldest brother Octavio (left).</p>
<p>They were often at war with The Elephant Boys of South London, the Yidishers and White Family, the Hoxton Mob of <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/the-real-peaky-blinders-attacking-coppers-gambling-on-horses-figh" target="_blank">Alfie Solomon</a>, centered in Soho, central London, and even the notorious Birmingham Boys (of <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/the-real-peaky-blinders-attacking-coppers-gambling-on-horses-figh" target="_blank">Peaky Blinders</a> fame) who were based over a hundred miles to the north of London.</p>
<p>The year Bert is born, the Sabini and Cortesi gangs were involved in a gunfight at The Fratellanzana social club on Great Bath Street, wounding Harry Sabini. The authorities suspected the four Cortesi brothers -Paul, George, Augustus, and Harry -but never convicted them. Harry would eventually take over the clan, but before that happens, Bert is part of the gang, acting as a driver and bodyguard for Darby, who would become described as “a gangster and racketeer of the worst type,” in a government document reporting on his activities as a potential suspect aiding the enemy during the Second World War.</p>
<p>His right-hand man, Pasqualino Pappa, who became the dominant force in London’s Italian criminal society during the 1950s and 1960s, would eventually take his place as head of the Italian gangs.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12290520296,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="333" alt="12290520296?profile=RESIZE_400x" /></a><em><strong>Photo: The Fratellanzana social club on Great Bath Street</strong></em></p>
<p>As Bert moves from adolescence to adulthood, the gangs of London absorb his life. The ones like Billy Kimber’s Camden Hill, and the Upton Park Mob, the Battersea Boys, the Brixton Mob, Jack Spot and Albert Dimes, Billy Hill and inevitably, the inexorable <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-boys-from-bethnal-green-how-the-infamous-kray-twins-ruled-the" target="_blank">Kray twins</a> of the East End and the infamous Richardson's who run their business and torture stables from factories and warehouses south of the Thames.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-boys-from-bethnal-green-how-the-infamous-kray-twins-ruled-the" target="_blank"><strong>The Boys from Bethnal Green: How the infamous Kray Twins ruled the London underworld</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Leaving school at fourteen, he spends his years thieving and fighting. One of his opponents, Joey Fusco, was part of another Italian gang in the neighborhood. After soundly beating him, Rossi finds acceptance with the local organized crime groups and begins his long career as part of the gangs of London.</p>
<p>Over his endlessly long life, he will be imbedded into the culture of street criminals. The one gang he did not mix with was the Messina Brothers. Sleazy imports, they were born and raised in Egypt and Malta of Italian parents. Moving to London in the late 1930s, they built their empire on prostitution, fueled by an endless demand through the American Army based in England during the war years. <em>People</em> newspaper reporter Duncan Webb exposed the brothers, Eugenio, Attilio, Carmelo, Salvatore, and Alfredo, in 1951, eventually leading to their arrest or their forced departure from the country because of the immense negative publicity. Attilio's statement, "We are more powerful than the British Government," quoted by the press, turned out to be a big mistake. The government and the law descended on them like the proverbial ton of bricks.</p>
<p>Salvatore, the eldest brother, is endlessly mistaken as Salvatore Maranzano, the New York based Mafia mob boss murdered in 1931. The Messina brothers laid the foundation for all the Maltese pimps, gangsters and assorted criminals that would flood the streets of Soho in the years after 1945.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12290520653,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="250" alt="12290520653?profile=RESIZE_400x" /></a>There were plenty of other groups fighting for control of London’s criminal underworld during this period. They included another English-Italian gangster called Alberto Dimeo. Ten years older than Rossi, he ran extortion and protection rackets along with bookmaking operations in Little Italy, and was one of Soho’s biggest loan sharks. Better known to the law and the media as Albert Dimes (right), he was continually at odds with another gangster, a man called Jack “Spot” Comer.</p>
<p>Born of Polish parents in London’s East End, he developed his criminal talents firstly in racehorse gambling control, then from running drinking clubs, and age-old extortion rackets across business targets, as well as police and political corruption on a scale not seen before in the capital city. At its peak, his gang may have had up to a thousand men on call.</p>
<p>In 1955, he found himself in a knife-fight with Albert Dimes. It was over who should control the major racecourses in the south of England. The stoush allegedly takes place in Frith Street, Soho, with both men stabbing each other with the same knife until a nearby shop-owner, one Sophia Hyams, ended the confrontation by whacking them both over the head with a large metal frying pan. When eventually brought to court, neither man was prepared to give evidence, and they adjourned the case.</p>
<p>In May 1956, a group of thugs this time including Rossi, attacked Comer, and he almost meets his end, while walking with his wife near their apartment in Cabell Street, near the Edgware Road. The ambush and razor-slashing of Comer was organized by Pappa and another London gangster called Billy Hill who was perhaps the only gangster to ever publicly announce in a court of law in July 1956, “I’m boss of the underworld.”</p>
<p>Born in Saint Pancras, inner London in 1911, he was allegedly one of the major drivers of organized crime in the metropolis though the second half of the 20th century, the man behind the biggest post office robbery in London in 1952 that netted the thieves the equivalent of almost nine million pounds.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12290521252,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="616" alt="12290521252?profile=RESIZE_710x" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Rossi and the Krays.</strong></em></p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12290520670,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="278" alt="12290520670?profile=RESIZE_400x" /></a>Early in their careers, the Krays work for Hill (right) as his heavies, at racetracks, ensuring the bookies were paying their dues for running their pitches under Hill’s control.</p>
<p>At his death, of natural causes in 1984, his death certificate ironically referred to his occupation as “demolition worker.”</p>
<p>Bert Rossi goes down for five years for his part in the attack on Comer and, while serving time at Winchester Prison, meets Ronnie Kray, who was doing his time for knifing one of his many enemies on the streets. He and his brother Reggie and others in his gang had confronted a group of rivals outside The Britannia pub in Stepney. The victim, Terrence Martin, was stabbed in the chest and head by Ronnie. Reggie walked, but the evidence put his brother away for the stretch.</p>
<p>Although Bert thought of Kray as “mad as a hatter,” they became friends, with Rossi, the older, more experienced gangster taking on the role of mentor. “Battles” would become close to both brothers and was often seen in photographs with them at social functions and sporting fixtures.</p>
<p>In the 1960s, Rossi makes contact with the underworld of America. His British passport logs him into America in February 1966 and March 1971 under the alias Roberto Fauzzi, but these were not his first visits.</p>
<p>His name is linked to John C. Berkery, allegedly a member and crew leader of the Philadelphia K & A gang, a group of Iris-American gangsters, operating in the Kensington area of north-east Philadelphia and through him, he meets Angelo Bruno, boss of the city’s Mafia family. And maybe through him, Carlo Gambino and Meyer Lansky.</p>
<p>Berkery was close to a captain in Bruno’s mob called John Martorano and they were both apparently heavily into drug trafficking, as well as the usual mob staples of extortion, gambling and hijacking.</p>
<p>Bert’s links to the American mob perhaps lead him to be their connection to the establishment of The Colony Sporting Club, in Berkley Square, London. It’s alleged, Bruno and Meyer Lansky, along with Dino Cellini, were the financiers and ageing, ailing George Raft, one-time movie star, is on hand to act as host and greeter, coxing in the suckers to spend big on food, drink and above all, gambling.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12290521296,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="389" alt="12290521296?profile=RESIZE_400x" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Rossi and Berkery.</strong></em></p>
<p>It lasted all of two years, from 1966, then the British Government stepped in. They banned George Raft as an undesirable, and the club simply became a memory like the immortal nightingale that sang in Berkley Square.</p>
<p>On 8 September 1975, someone shot and killed Beatrice "Biddy" Gold in the basement of her clothing business at 364 Goswell Road in Clerkenwell. Subsequently, authorities arrested, tried, and convicted Errol Heibner, a thirty-year-old South African, for the killing. The incident occurred at around 5.15pm that evening, with the victim being shot three times by a .32 revolver.</p>
<p>A flooring contractor, identified as Roberto Rosa-Fauzza, aka Albert Rossi, is suspect in supplying the weapon and setting up the murder. It was alleged, the murder was a contract-hit, paying Rossi and Heibner £20,000. This mystery involves Vincent De Marco and Michael Miller, both of Florida. De Marco and his wife had visited London, meeting up with Rossi, before departing back to America, two days before the killing of Gold. De Marco had been one of the investors linked into the short-lived Colony Club.</p>
<p>Although both defendants made verbal and written statements as to their guilt, Rossi's good brief led to his acquittal.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-left" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12290521875,RESIZE_180x180{{/staticFileLink}}" width="111" alt="12290521875?profile=RESIZE_180x180" /></a>Heibner (left) served a minimum sentence of 25 years and was released in 2010. His case has become something of a cause célèbre, with him claiming they set him up and he was innocent of the killing.</p>
<p>It was claimed his was the longest miscarriage of justice case in British legal history. However, in 2014, authorities tried and convicted him on drug trafficking charges, sentencing him to a lengthy prison term. Maybe if you're a criminal, it’s just really hard to stay straight.</p>
<p>The murder of Beatrice Gold is not the only one that perhaps connects to Bert Rossi. He was questioned by the police in their investigation into the apparent suicide of ex-boxer and celebrity, Freddie Mills, who was found dead in his car behind his club-Freddie Mills Nitespot-in Charing Cross Road, in Soho, on the night of July 25, 1965. Rossi had been involved in negotiating Mills’s exit from the club, on behalf of Ronnie Kay, who as acting for the other club partner, Andy Ho. It was a complex, confusing situation, that dragged in all kinds of peripheral criminal activities, including the infamous ‘Jack the Stripper” serial killer who had terrorized parts of West London between 1959 and 1964.</p>
<p>Following his acquittal on the murder charge, Rossi withdraws from active gangland life and settles into forty years of retirement. He becomes friends and associates with a newly emerging gang in Clerkenwell.</p>
<p>Formed in the early 1980s, the Adams Family, sometimes referred to as the A-Team, is a crime syndicate formed by Terry, Patrick and Tommy Adams. Born of Irish parents in Islington, London, they have grown to be major racketeers dealing in extortion, drugs, bookmaking, money laundering, people trafficking, smuggling, just about everything. It’s claimed they have amassed earnings north of £200 million. All the brothers have served lengthy prison sentences over the last forty years.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12290522293,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="230" alt="12290522293?profile=RESIZE_400x" /></a>Bert Rossi (right) died, aged 94, at his home in Colebrook Row, in the borough of Angel. He was less than two miles from where he had been born, all those years ago. It is July 2, 2017. His long journey through a world most of us will never comprehend comes to an end, peacefully.</p>
<p>Apart from a narcissist, nobody really craves attention for its own sake. Building a bridge to fame and notoriety was so far from Bert Rossi’s agenda, it didn’t even earn a spark on a dark night. He was the ultimate low-key gangster who did what he did without fear or favor, but always on the downside of a shadow.</p>
<p>At his funeral service in St Peter’s Italian Church, in Little Italy, he was serenaded by music from the movie, The Godfather. Was this in tribute to his links to American mobsters, or simply good old-fashioned bad taste, something the London gangs no doubt understood better than most.</p>
<p>Nietzsche may have got it right when he claimed, “Truths are illusions which we have forgotten are illusions.”</p>
<p>Like fire-flies, flitting across a landscape of criminal intent, the thieves and thugs search endlessly for their source of energy in Britain’s biggest metropolis. As long as the city endures, there will surely be the Gangs of London.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/thom-l-jones-mob-corner">Thom L. Jones' Mob Corner</a> or the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">Organized Crime in Europe section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Thom L. Jones & Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
British drug bosses taken down after police crack communications – Pro football player kicked off investigation
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/british-drug-bosses-taken-down-after-police-crack-communications
2023-09-08T11:27:04.000Z
2023-09-08T11:27:04.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/12219415690?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>A West Yorkshire-based organized crime group that trafficked cocaine were sentenced Wednesday to a combined 49 years behind bars. Their prison terms follow a National Crime Agency investigation under Operation Venetic – the UK’s response to the takedown of the encrypted communications platform EncroChat.</p>
<p>Carl O’Flaherty, 38, Paul Shepherd, 45, Clinton Blakey, 38, and Dane Marshall, 42, all from Leeds, were found to be members of the crime group that supplied class A drugs across north west England.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}12219415701,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="710" alt="12219415701?profile=RESIZE_710x" /></a><em><strong>Photo: From L to R: O’Flaherty, Shepherd, Marshall, Blakey</strong></em></p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Pro footballer kicks off investigation</strong></span></p>
<p>The investigation began in April 2020 when former professional footballer Shepherd – who played for clubs including Leeds United and Luton Town – was stopped by police while driving in Leeds. Officers searched the ex-footballer’s car and seized a fist-sized bag of cocaine and an EncroChat handset.</p>
<p>Forensic examination of the EncroChat device unearthed messages proving the drugs belonged to O’Flaherty, who had instructed Shepherd to move and store them. On the day of the arrest, O’Flaherty – the leader of the crime group – sent a message to an associate stating Shepherd had £112,500 which was due to be taken to Liverpool on his behalf.</p>
<p>O’Flaherty ran the drug supply operation from a number of addresses in West Yorkshire. One such property in Bradford was used as a laboratory in an unsuccessful attempt to extract cocaine from oil, and a second address in Leeds stored and pressed kilo blocks of the drug for onward supply.</p>
<p>At the Leeds property, officers found 13 kilos of amphetamine, large quantities of chemicals used to dilute cocaine and equipment that evidenced 12 kilos of cocaine was repackaged there.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>EncroChat gave insight into business</strong></span></p>
<p>The economics of O’Flaherty’s business model were laid bare on EncroChat – he would purchase three kilos of high purity cocaine for £123,000, dilute the drugs with cheap chemicals and resell four kilos for £150,000.</p>
<p>Drug dealers one step down the supply chain would purchase the cocaine, including Blakey who was one of O’Flaherty’s regular customers. EncroChat messages uncovered their business relationship, as the pair exchanged photographs of cocaine blocks and discussed pricing.</p>
<p>Blakey would add more cheap ingredients to the blocks of cocaine before selling them on at a profit. He was also found to be involved in supplying cannabis.</p>
<p>Marshall, whose EncroChat username was ‘kingchef-uk’, was employed by O’Flaherty to dilute, press and repackage the cocaine blocks to be ready for distribution – a role often titled ‘chef’. He also setup a company named ‘Northface Landscaped Ltd’ to launder the cash proceeds of the group’s activity.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Arrests</strong></span></p>
<p>Investigators linked all the men to the crime group using EncroChat messaging data acquired after Shepherd’s April 2020 arrest. O’Flaherty, Blakey and Marshall were then arrested between May and July in 2020.</p>
<p>Blakey failed to appear at court to face charges in October 2020 and a warrant was issued for his arrest. NCA investigators traced him to Madrid in 2021, where he was arrested by Spanish Police. However he fled again after being given bail in Spain. He was then arrested in Marbella in May this year following a surveillance operation and returned to the UK on 8 June where he was immediately put into custody.</p>
<p>On Wednesday, September 6, at Leeds Crown Court O’Flaherty was sentenced to 17 years and 10 months imprisonment Shepherd to nine years and six months and Marshall to six years and six months. Blakey was sentenced to 12 years, in addition to the remaining three years and six months from a separate drugs conviction.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
English linchpin in Europe’s drug underworld told to fork over £630,000 – Bragged of his 20-year crime career
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/english-linchpin-in-europe-s-drug-underworld-told-to-fork-over-63
2023-05-25T04:30:24.000Z
2023-05-25T04:30:24.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/11148175086?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>A former haulage firm owner in England who was imprisoned for moving drugs and dirty cash across Europe has been ordered to pay back £630,000. 42-year-old Thomas Maher was sentenced to 14 years and eight months in prison in December 2020.</p>
<p>Evidence obtained by Great Britain’s National Crime Agency (NCA) as part of Operation Venetic – the UK law enforcement response to the takedown of encrypted global communications service EncroChat – showed that he operated a transportation network spanning Europe, moving drugs into the United Kingdom (UK) and Ireland and the profits in the other direction.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>20 years of crime paid well</strong></span></p>
<p>In one exchange of messages with a criminal associate he bragged that he had been involved in organized crime for more than 20 years.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/foxtrot-one-one-is-down-the-braybrook-street-massacre" target="_blank"><strong>Foxtrot One One is Down: The Braybrook Street Massacre</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>On Monday, a judge at Liverpool Crown Court made a confiscation order for £629,159.15, including his house in Warrington, cars, lorries, jewelry, a number of high value watches, artwork and gold ingots bought in Dubai. He has three months to pay or faces an extra six years in jail.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}11148175663,RESIZE_584x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="11148175663?profile=RESIZE_584x" width="476" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Maher's ride.</strong> </em></p>
<p>“Thomas Maher was a career criminal who was trusted by some of Europe’s biggest crime groups to move their drugs and money,” The NCA’s Head of Asset Denial, Rob Burgess, said. “The confiscation order will ensure money he made will be returned to the public purse to fund further efforts to protect the public from organized crime.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>39 dead Vietnamese</strong></span></p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}11148175680,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="11148175680?profile=RESIZE_400x" width="350" /></a>Maher (right) came onto the NCA’s radar after he was arrested as part of the investigation into the deaths of 39 Vietnamese migrants in a lorry in Purfleet in October 2019. The tractor unit involved had at one point been owned by Maher, and was still registered in his wife’s name even after it was sold.</p>
<p>He was released with no further action taken by Essex Police, but an NCA financial investigation revealed that despite him and his wife being on less than minimum wage for tax purposes, they lived a luxurious lifestyle.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/exclusive-the-art-of-smuggling-by-britain-s-first-drug-baron" target="_blank"><strong>‘The Art of Smuggling’ by Britain’s first drug baron</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>During a seven month surveillance operation NCA officers watched Maher meet with criminal associates at hotels and in public spaces in the North West to organize the trafficking of cocaine from the Netherlands to the UK and Ireland.</p>
<p>As well as drugs, Maher also helped to facilitate the movement of large sums of cash, charging a commission for his involvement.</p>
<p>NCA officers arrested Maher on June 13, 2020 at his home in Warrington, after receiving intelligence that he planned to leave the country. He was sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court in December 2020 after pleading guilty to importing drugs and money laundering.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
British crew busted for smuggling cocaine and cannabis from the Netherlands to Ireland and Great Britain
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/british-crew-busted-for-smuggling-cocaine-and-cannabis-from-the-n
2023-05-23T12:16:32.000Z
2023-05-23T12:16:32.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/11143221481?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>Four men who conspired to supply drugs from the Netherlands to the United Kingdom and Ireland have been convicted following an investigation by Britain’s National Crime Agency (NCA). The “kingpin” of this operation was 49-year-old Anthony Terry, from Wolverhampton, who organized the importation.</p>
<p>Terry was under surveillance when £1.6 million worth of cocaine was seized at Belfast port on February 22, 2021. The drugs were transported from the Netherlands to England and then across on the ferry to Northern Ireland in fuel tanks being transported within a van.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}11143221286,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="710" alt="11143221286?profile=RESIZE_710x" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Anthony Terry and Mohammed Omar Khan</strong></em></p>
<p>When Terry learned about the seizure, officers watched him in the Wolverhampton area moving identical fuel tanks to those found in the van so they would not be linked to him. He was arrested the same day.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/hardened-gangster-told-child-actor-you-are-the-only-person-who-ha" target="_blank"><strong>Hardened gangster told child actor: “You are the only person who said that to me and lived to tell tale”</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Terry and his organized crime group associates were using the encrypted messaging service Encrochat and the NCA identified other occasions in 2020 when he had smuggled drugs and cash for other organized crime groups.</p>
<p>“This was a sophisticated operation to smuggle drugs into the UK and Ireland to make significant profit,” Mick Pope, NCA Branch Commander, said. “Terry was the kingpin of this group, offering a service to criminals who needed to obtain drugs or move money.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Driving to the Netherlands to get coke</strong></span></p>
<p>Terry had enlisted 62-year-old Michael Collis, also from Wolverhampton, to travel to the Netherlands where he would meet contacts to pick up the cocaine, concealing it in his van.</p>
<p>Two more drivers were recruited by Terry. Mohammed Omar Khan, 38, from Birmingham, supplied drugs to customers in the UK and Joshpal Singh Kothiria, 33, from Wolverhampton supplied them in the Republic of Ireland.</p>
<p>Terry instructed Collis to travel to the Netherlands on April 6, 2020 and he collected 17.5 kilos of cocaine. From there, the drugs were divided up and, while Khan delivered six kilos to Luton and four to Slough, Collis travelled to the Republic of Ireland to hand over the remaining five-and-a-half kilos in County Wicklow.</p>
<p>At the same time, Terry sent Kothiria to East London to collect 10 kilos of cannabis and a vacuum packing machine. Kothiria brought these back to the West Midlands where the cannabis was packed before he took it to County Leitrim in the Republic of Ireland.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/drug-dealer-who-impersonated-mma-champion-conor-mcgregor-jailed" target="_blank"><strong>Drug dealer who impersonated MMA champion Conor McGregor jailed</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>A couple of weeks later, Collis picked up 18 kilos of cocaine in the Netherlands, going on to deliver 10 kilos to dealers in the UK before taking the rest to Ireland.</p>
<p>The final drug run captured on Encrochat occurred between May 26 and June 3, 2020, where Terry discussed a cannabis delivery. Kothiria was sent to pick up the load from Leicestershire and take it to the Republic of Ireland.</p>
<p>Later in June 2020, authorities cracked the Encrochat service and were able to read the messages sent back and forth by criminals around the world. This resulted in the abandonment of the platform.</p>
<p>Terry and Collis continued their criminality, however, and NCA investigators established that Collis had travelled to the Hook of Holland again in July and September 2020 before returning to England and travelling onward to Belfast. He then distributed the drugs in Limerick in the Republic of Ireland.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Busted</strong></span></p>
<p>Collis and Kothiria were arrested in March 2021. Khan had been arrested earlier, in December 2020.</p>
<p>Following a trial in November 2022, Terry was jailed for 18 years in relation to the Belfast cocaine seizure. He was charged with the additional drug trafficking offences linked to the messages found on his Encrochat device in April 2022 and pleaded guilty in April this year.</p>
<p>Collis also pleaded guilty to drug trafficking offences in April.</p>
<p>Kothiria and Khan were convicted on May 19 at Wolverhampton Crown Court after a two-week trial.</p>
<p>All four men will be sentenced at a later date to be confirmed.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Two British drug bosses sentenced after their text messages were decrypted, revealed drug and gun deals
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/two-british-drug-bosses-sentenced-after-their-text-messages-were
2023-04-30T07:53:21.000Z
2023-04-30T07:53:21.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/11038012070?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>Two British crime bosses who conspired to buy and supply drugs and guns on the encrypted communications platform EncroChat have been imprisoned. Raj Singh, 45, and Waqas Iqbal, 41, plotted multi-kilo consignments of cocaine and heroin between March and May 2020. Singh was sentenced in February, Iqbal on Friday.</p>
<p>National Crime Agency officers proved Singh and Iqbal ran an organized crime group and regularly worked together to buy and sell drugs and firearms. They also planned to launder money and send ketamine to Canada.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/how-gangsters-try-and-fail-to-evade-government-surveillance" target="_blank"><strong>How gangsters try (and fail) to evade government surveillance</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>“Though Iqbal and Singh operated within the London area they had criminal connections in multiple countries within mainland Europe and further afield,” Dean Wallbank, NCA operations manager, said. “Like other high end dealers, Iqbal and Singh are toxic and responsible for causing very serious levels of harm to society. They didn’t care what bloodshed the guns and drugs led to, just as long as they made money.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Coke, heroin, and guns</strong></span></p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-left" src="{{#staticFileLink}}11038012475,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="232" alt="11038012475?profile=RESIZE_400x" /></a>They were not known by their real names <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/how-gangsters-try-and-fail-to-evade-government-surveillance" target="_blank">EncroChat</a> but by ‘handles’. Singh was called Salmonagent and Iqbal (left) was Ghostshooter. The National Crime Agency led Operation Venetic, which was the British side of the international takedown of EncroChat in 2020. The platform was used by countless criminals – from Mafiosi to drug bosses – around the globe.</p>
<p>In one EncroChat exchange, Iqbal told a criminal contact that his OCG had its name on 150 kilos of cocaine and 100 kilos of heroin.</p>
<p>The crucial phone evidence also showed the pair conspiring on firearms details. At the end of March 2020 Iqbal supplied a contact with ammunition for a 7.65 Browning at a meeting on Acacia Road, in London E17.</p>
<p>A week later Singh and Iqbal discussed a firearm that Iqbal had hidden in a wall.</p>
<p>Over the next few days between 8 and 10 April the men discussed buying another firearm from a contact on EncroChat for £8,000.</p>
<p>On April 24, Iqbal told a criminal contact that he had bought a Walther Creed semi-automatic handgun with 50 bullets for £6,000.</p>
<p>A conversation four weeks later between Iqbal and Singh revealed the bullets weren’t delivered on that deal, but they had also agreed to buy a Skorpion machine pistol for £6,000.</p>
<p>The messages between Singh and Iqbal revealed how significant their offending was. The men had not only been involved in many multiple kilo deals to buy and supply drugs, the decrypted messages revealed that in April 2020 Iqbal was in the process of repaying £385,000 for drugs he had taken on credit.</p>
<p>Decrypted messages between April and May 2020 also showed the OCG in conversations about laundering 151,500 euros from the UK to the Netherlands. Singh also plotted to send ketamine to Canada.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Pub fight with a female cop</strong></span></p>
<p>Iqbal admitted conspiracy to import 10 kilos of cocaine, conspiracy to transfer a prohibited weapon and money laundering.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}11038012098,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="295" alt="11038012098?profile=RESIZE_400x" /></a>Singh (right) admitted conspiracy to supply cocaine, conspiracy to supply ketamine and money laundering. He also admitted assault occasioning actual bodily harm upon police on a separate matter.</p>
<p>In February this year Singh – also known as Rajinder Singh Bassi – was sentenced to eight years and 10 months at Guildford Crown Court.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/they-whacked-the-payphone-the-american-mafia-bids-it-farewell-wit" target="_blank"><strong>They whacked the payphone! The American Mafia bids it farewell with tears in its eyes</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>The sentence also included 16 months for assault occasioning actual bodily harm upon a female police officer. Singh was involved in a pub fight in which he kicked the police officer’s leg as she tried to restrain him. The officer required significant rehabilitation upon her knee and cannot return to front line policing due to the injuries.</p>
<p>On Friday, at the same court, Iqbal was sentenced to 12 years in prison.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p></div>
“I normally get arrested for drugs” - Pilot joked after arrest over botched people smuggling attempt
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/i-normally-get-arrested-for-drugs-pilot-joked-after-arrest-over-b
2023-04-29T15:28:09.000Z
2023-04-29T15:28:09.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/11037792459?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=380"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>A British pilot and career criminal was imprisoned on Friday alongside two other men in connection with a plot to fly four Albanian illegal immigrants into the United Kingdom. As the pilot was arrested he joked: “I normally get arrested for drugs, so it’s a bit strange.”</p>
<p>As part of a National Crime Agency investigation, 53-year-old Richard Styles was arrested at Deenethorpe Airfield near Corby, Northamptonshire, in March 2022. He had just flown his twin-engine plane to the airfield from Belgium, carrying with him three men and a woman who were all attempting to evade immigration checks.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}11037792099,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="710" alt="11037792099?profile=RESIZE_710x" /></a><strong><em>Photo (left to right): Richard Styles, Silvano Turchet and Vijayakumar Sivakumar</em></strong></p>
<p>NCA investigators found that Styles had worked with former pilot and fellow aviation buff Silvano Turchet, aged 68, to rent the six-seater Piper Seneca for £1,500 from an airfield in Lincolnshire.</p>
<p>Styles flew it down to Deenethorpe, where Turchet had paid for it to be stored in a hangar before flying to Belgium on March 23.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/buccaneer-the-story-of-drug-smuggling-pilot-jack-reed" target="_blank"><strong>Buccaneer: The Story of Drug Smuggling Pilot Jack Reed</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Investigators believe the men were in contact with an Albanian known as ‘Tim K’ who arranged for Styles’ illegal passengers to meet him in Belgium. When the plane returned to the UK the next day, an NCA surveillance team was waiting.</p>
<p>As Styles was arrested he joked: “I normally get arrested for drugs, so it’s a bit strange.”</p>
<p>Shortly after Styles’ arrest the Albanian group were detained by Northants Police officers, who were working with the NCA, in a Mercedes taxi driven by Vijayakumar Sivakumar. The migrants were handed to the immigration authorities.</p>
<p>Sivakumar, 43, who was previously convicted for trying to smuggle someone into the UK in the boot of his car, was also arrested. Phone records showed he had been in contact with Tim K in the run up to the flight.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Smuggling ecstasy and cannabis</strong></span></p>
<p>Styles had previous convictions for using a plane to smuggle ecstasy tablets out of Belgium in 2003, and drop cannabis into Jersey the same year while he was on the run from the Belgian authorities. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison in 2006, where he is believed to have met Turchet.</p>
<p>The pair were arrested by the Dutch authorities in 2017 in connection with another people smuggling enterprise. Styles would later be convicted in his absence – he was already in custody in the UK by the time the case came to trial.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/american-pilot-for-juarez-drug-cartel-gets-14-years-in-prison" target="_blank"><strong>American pilot for Juarez drug cartel gets 14 years in prison</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Turchet was arrested at his home in Nottingham in July 2022 after NCA investigators identified him as the organizer. He initially denied knowledge of the plot, even though phone data put him near Deenethorpe airfield on 24 March and showed he’d called Styles nine times.</p>
<p><strong><span style="font-size:14pt;">Guilt and punishment</span> </strong></p>
<p>All three men were charged with facilitating a breach of immigration law, a charge Styles admitted at a hearing on August 8, 2022.</p>
<p>Turchet pleaded guilty on the first day of his trial, while Sivakumar was found guilty by a jury after a five day trial at Leicester Crown Court in February 2023.</p>
<p>On April 28, a judge at the same court sentenced Styles to seven years in prison, Turchet to seven-and-a-half years, and Sivakumar to four-and-a-half years.</p>
<p>“Styles was a career criminal who previously used his piloting skills to move consignments of drugs around Europe,” NCA Regional Head of Investigations Jacque Beer said. “On this occasion he was offering a luxury end to end service, bringing people into the UK using a private plane. His comments to my officers show that he considered getting arrested nothing more than an occupational hazard.”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
£100 million smuggled in suitcases by money laundering cash couriers
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/100-million-smuggled-in-suitcases-by-money-laundering-cash-courie
2023-04-27T08:17:08.000Z
2023-04-27T08:17:08.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/11036856499?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>British authorities dismantled a network of criminal cash couriers that laundered over £100 million by smuggling it out of the United Kingdom (UK) to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The investigation was led by the National Crime Agency (NCA).</p>
<p>Eleven of the couriers have now been convicted, following Tuesday’s guilty verdicts returned in the trial of Beatrice Auty, 26, from London; Jonathan Johnson, 55, and Jo Emma Larvin, 44, both from Ripon in North Yorkshire, and Amy Harrison, 27, from Worcester Park in Surrey, at Isleworth Crown Court.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}11036856671,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="710" alt="11036856671?profile=RESIZE_710x" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Custody images of (from left to right) Beatrice Auty, Jonathan Johnson and Jo Emma Larvin</strong></em></p>
<p>Their network smuggled more than £104 million from the UK to Dubai during 83 separate trips between November 2019 and October 2020, overseen by ringleader Abdullah Alfalsi, 47, who was jailed for more than nine years in July last year.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/british-boss-brian-wright" target="_blank"><strong>The Milkman always delivers - Profile of British drug boss Brian Wright</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>“The laundering of such vast quantities of cash around the globe enables organized criminals and corrupt elites to clean or hide their ill-gotten gains,” Adrian Searle, Director of the National Economic Crime Centre in the NCA, said. “Cash smugglers typically work on behalf of International Controller Networks, who move the finances of the international drug trade, people traffickers, fraudsters and other criminal groups, making the source of the money difficult to trace.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Sunshine and lollipops</strong></span></p>
<p>The couriers, who were paid around £3,000 for each trip and would be booked on business class flights due to the extra luggage allowance, communicated on a Whatsapp group entitled ‘Sunshine and lollipops’.</p>
<p>Investigators established that courier Tara Hanlon, who was convicted in June 2021, had briefed another courier about the operation. The courier had travelled from Heathrow to Dubai on three occasions in August and September 2020, checking in 18 suitcases which contained £6.8 million.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/irish-mob-boss-daniel-kinahan-hires-a-special-forces-instructor-t" target="_blank"><strong>Irish mob boss Daniel Kinahan hires a Special Forces instructor to teach his crew evasive maneuvers and shooting skills</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Auty, who was arrested following NCA raids in May 2021, travelled the same route twice in July and August of that year, checking in seven suitcases containing £3.4 million. Czech national Zdenek Kamaryt, who was convicted of money laundering in March 2021, joined her on the second trip.</p>
<p>Auty was involved in the logistical arrangements for another 16 trips, helping to pack cash into suitcases, accompanying travellers to Heathrow and collecting empty suitcases when they returned so they could be used again.</p>
<p>Larvin made two trips to Dubai in August and September 2020; one with Amy Harrison when they took seven cases between them containing £2.2 million and another with her partner Jonathan Johnson, when they took eight suitcases containing £2.8 million.</p>
<p>Larvin and Johnson were arrested at Manchester Airport in March 2022.</p>
<p>Harrison made three trips between July and September 2020, taking 15 suitcases containing around £6m.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Drug profits</strong></span></p>
<p>The network collected cash from criminal groups around the UK, which was believed to be the profits of drug dealing, and took it to counting houses, usually rented apartments in Central London.</p>
<p>The money was then vacuum packed and separated into suitcases which would typically each contain around £500,000, weighing around 40 kilos. They were sprayed with coffee or air fresheners in an effort to prevent them being found by Border Force detection dogs.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/one-of-britain-s-most-wanted-drug-traffickers-caught-in-dubai" target="_blank"><strong>One of Britain’s most wanted drug traffickers caught in Dubai</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Five other couriers have pleaded guilty at previous hearings and will be sentenced at a later date, along with those convicted yesterday. They are:</p>
<ul>
<li> Nicola Esson, 56, from Leeds, and Stacey Borg, 41, of Pudsey, West Yorkshire, who were arrested in May 2021. Esson travelled from Heathrow to Dubai on three occasions in August and September 2020, checking in 19 suitcases with a combined weight of almost half a tonne. Borg made three trips to Dubai during the same period, on one occasion travelling with Esson. She declared £1.8 million in cash to Dubai customs in September 2020 and £2.5 million the following month.</li>
<li> Paige Henry, 25, from Birmingham, made four trips to Dubai in August and September 2020, one alone and three with other couriers, carrying a total of 24 suitcases containing £8.25 million.</li>
<li> Megan Reeves, 30, from Doncaster, was arrested alongside Hanlon in October 2020, with five suitcases between them containing £2 million. Messages showed the pair had known each other since 2017. At the time Reeves claimed they were going on a ‘girly holiday’ to Dubai but communications showed she intended to make 13 trips to clear debts of £39,000.</li>
<li> Muhammad Ilyas, 30, from Slough, was arrested by NCA officers at Heathrow Airport after in February 2020 after arriving on a flight from Dubai. He had checked in four suitcases at the airport ten days earlier, one of which had gone missing, and declared almost £1.5 million in cash to Dubai Customs. The missing suitcase was subsequently found by Border Force officers, and contained £431,360 in cash.</li>
</ul>
<p>Other couriers remain under investigation.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Members of crime group sentenced for running industrial scale amphetamine factory in Scotland
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/members-of-crime-group-sentenced-for-running-industrial-scale-amp
2023-04-19T16:12:41.000Z
2023-04-19T16:12:41.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/11030228070?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>Four members of an organized crime group that ran an industrial scale amphetamine lab in Scotland, and trafficked heroin and cocaine, have been sentenced yesterday. A National Crime Agency (NCA) investigation dismantled the crew which was based in Merseyside and run by 49-year-old kingpin Terence Earle.</p>
<p>Earle used the encrypted communications platform EncroChat to organise his criminality and enlisted the help of subordinates Stanley Feerick, 68, and Stephen Singleton, 36, from Liverpool, and Stephen King, 49, from Dumbarton, Scotland.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}11030227476,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="710" alt="11030227476?profile=RESIZE_710x" /></a><em><strong>Pictured (left to right): Terence Earle, Stephen Singleton, Lee Baxter and Stephen King</strong></em></p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Seizures</strong></span></p>
<p>In December 2020 Lancashire Police, acting on NCA intelligence, seized more than 560 kilos of alpha-phenylacetoacetamide (APAA) - a chemical used in the production of amphetamine - from the group, which Singleton had supplied. This would have been capable of producing around £1.1m worth of amphetamine at the lab in Scotland.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/the-10-best-gangster-tv-series-made-outside-the-usa" target="_blank"><strong>The 10 best gangster TV series made outside the USA</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>The substance was found in a lorry which had been loaded from a warehouse on an industrial estate near a caravan park in Weeton, Lancashire, on the orders of Feerick.</p>
<p>The previous month, at the request of the NCA, Feerick had been arrested by Lancashire Police as he drove a lorry southbound on the M6 motorway. Officers discovered a hold all containing 2.9 kilos of heroin worth £300,000, and £20,000 in cash.</p>
<p>A search of Feerick’s home led to the recovery of another £9,370 in cash.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>EncroChat</strong></span></p>
<p>NCA inquiries found that Earle had also used EncroChat to oversee the trafficking of heroin and cocaine from Scotland to Merseyside, and in the opposite direction, with the assistance of Lee Baxter, 48, of Huyton, Liverpool.</p>
<p>All of the group members were arrested by the NCA in March 2021.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/profile-of-british-drug-boss-robert-the-voice-dawes-he-was-prepar" target="_blank"><strong>Profile of British drug boss Robert “The Voice” Dawes - “He was prepared to use extreme levels of violence”</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Earle and Baxter pleaded guilty at Liverpool Crown Court on October 3 last year, with Feerick changing his plea to guilty on the day he was due to stand trial. King was convicted by a jury on December 15, following an eight-day trial. Singleton pleaded guilty on February 9 this year.</p>
<p>Yesterday, at the same court, Earle was sentenced to 16-and-a-half years imprisonment, Singleton to three years and four months , Baxter to 22 months (suspended for 18 months) and King to 18 months (suspended for 18 months). Feerick is due to be sentenced on May 3.</p>
<p>The NCA’s investigation formed part of Operation Venetic, the UK NCA-led law enforcement response to the takedown of the EncroChat service in July 2020. It was supported by the Scottish Organised Crime Partnership (OCP) – a joint NCA and Police Scotland unit – and the Serious Organised Crime Taskforce.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Gold shipment forfeited after British authorities link it to South American drug cartels
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gold-shipment-forfeited-after-british-authorities-link-it-to-sout
2023-03-24T19:02:35.000Z
2023-03-24T19:02:35.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/11002828676?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>Britain’s National Crime Agency (NCA) has obtained a civil recovery order for gold worth an estimated £4 million that was being laundered by South American drug cartels, the NCA announced Tuesday. Financial investigators took up the case after the shipment of gold weighing 104 kilos was seized at Heathrow in June 2019.</p>
<p>The gold was in the cargo section of a plane which had arrived from the Cayman Islands. It was being transported from the Caymans to Switzerland via Heathrow, having earlier been shipped to the Caymans on a private jet which had arrived from Venezuela.</p>
<p>NCA officers worked closely with authorities in the Cayman Islands to prove a false paperwork trail had been created to hide the true origin of the gold as Venezuela, and that those involved in the organization and physical movement of the gold had links to organized crime.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/robbers-set-french-highway-ablaze-as-they-steal-2-5-million-in-go" target="_blank"><strong>Robbers set French highway ablaze as they steal €2.5 million in gold</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Following settlement discussions and an application to the High Court, the NCA obtained a civil recovery order over 80 per cent of the gold under the Proceeds of Crime Act. The remaining 20 per cent will be returned to companies with a financial interest in the gold.</p>
<p>NCA Branch Commander Andy Noyes said: “Criminals are attracted to gold as a way of moving drugs money due to the high value contained in relatively small amounts. Our investigation showed this shipment was linked to drug cartels operating out of South America, but we were able to stop it reaching its final destination thanks to established links with overseas partners. This intervention has disrupted the criminal network, stopping them from reinvesting in further criminality that causes harm to our communities.”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
One of Britain’s most wanted drug bosses gets 12 years in prison
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/one-of-britain-s-most-wanted-drug-bosses-gets-12-years-in-prison
2023-03-19T13:58:51.000Z
2023-03-19T13:58:51.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10999862463?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>A British drug boss who went on the run for 8 years over his role in a large-scale international drug trafficking plot has been jailed for 12 years. 37-year-old Michael Paul Moogan, who was one of the UK’s most wanted men, fled in October 2013 after a raid on a cafe suspected of being a front for meetings between drug traffickers and <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/drug-cartels" target="_blank">cartels</a>.</p>
<p>The Café de Ketel in Rotterdam was a business not open to the public. It could only be entered via a security system and was strictly for known faces.</p>
<p>Working with the Dutch National Crime Squad, the National Crime Agency became aware of information that linked Moogan and two other British men to the venue which was the hub for Moogan’s conspiracy to bring hundreds of kilos of cocaine into the UK every month.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/the-real-peaky-blinders-attacking-coppers-gambling-on-horses-figh" target="_blank"><strong>The Real Peaky Blinders: Attacking coppers, gambling on horses, fighting with fists and guns</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>At the time of the raid, only one of the men, Robert Hamilton, 71, from Hale, Greater Manchester, could be found. He was jailed for 8 years in 2014 after pleading guilty to drug charges.</p>
<p>The other man, Robert Gerard, 57, from Liverpool, handed himself in to the NCA after three years on the run claiming the pressure was too much. He pleaded guilty to drug trafficking charges and was jailed in 2017 for 14 years.</p>
<p>Moogan and his associates were involved in plans to import drugs from Latin America to <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview" target="_blank">Europe</a>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-untouchables-how-britain-s-top-gangsters-rich-off-armed-robbe" target="_blank"><strong>The Untouchables: How Britain’s top gangsters got rich off armed robberies and smuggling tons of drugs</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>He had the ability to obtain as much as €500,000 at a time to fund his cocaine deals from South American suppliers who would ship the drug to Belgium. He did not need to pay for deals in instalments as is common in large scale drugs supply. Instead, he could pay in lump sums via Iraqi nationals based in the UK.</p>
<p>Moogan told criminal contacts that he brought cocaine into the UK concealed in meat from Argentina. Evidence also showed he had the ability to bribe port officials to help ensure his drugs were not stopped.</p>
<p>As well as shipping from South America, Moogan used road transport networks stretching from Bulgaria to Latvia, Spain and Belgium to facilitate the movement of cocaine to the UK.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Hiding in Dubai</strong></span></p>
<p>Moogan remained in hiding until April 2021 when he was <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/one-of-britain-s-most-wanted-drug-traffickers-caught-in-dubai" target="_blank">arrested by Dubai Police</a>. NCA officers established Moogan was using numerous false identities to avoid capture.</p>
<p>Dubai Police believe that after entering the UAE using a different identity, he tried to avoid CCTV in an attempt to elude detectives who used their latest capabilities to track him down.</p>
<p>He had a German passport, and also a driver’s license and citizen card in the name of Michael Dier but displaying his own image.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-boys-from-bethnal-green-how-the-infamous-kray-twins-ruled-the" target="_blank"><strong>The Boys from Bethnal Green: How the infamous Kray Twins ruled the London underworld</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Moogan was the 86th person arrested under Operation Captura – an NCA fugitive campaign run in conjunction with Crimestoppers.</p>
<p>NCA Senior Investigating Officer Ben Rutter said: “Moogan did everything he could to avoid this day but justice has finally caught up with him. He was a major figure in international drug dealing. His consignments of Class A drugs undoubtedly brought misery and real harm to the UK communities they reached.”</p>
<p>After being extradited to the UK, he told the NCA arresting officer: “You’re not going to have any trouble from me. I’m tired now. Get me up to Manny and get me in Cat A. I’m done now.”</p>
<p>Moogan was transported to police custody in Greater Manchester. In November last year he appeared at Manchester Crown Court and admitted conspiring to import drugs.</p>
<p>He returned to court on Friday and was jailed.</p>
<p>Without his guilty plea and mitigation he would have been sentenced to 20 years.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
“I just need 2 bullets in a gun” - Prolific drugs and gun trafficker jailed for supplying crime groups throughout Britain
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/i-just-need-2-bullets-in-a-gun-prolific-drugs-and-gun-trafficker
2023-03-02T05:55:41.000Z
2023-03-02T05:55:41.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10978634868?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>A man who supplied firearms to organized crime groups across the United Kingdom was imprisoned Wednesday for over 19 years after law enforcement cracked the encrypted communications platform EncroChat. 50-year-old Michael Derrane orchestrated, supplied and transferred firearms and multiple kilos of narcotics wholesale, selling them on to criminals for a profit.</p>
<p>Evidence from <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/how-gangsters-try-and-fail-to-evade-government-surveillance" target="_blank">encrypted messages</a> showed Derrane, from Morpeth, was well known to serious organised crime groups in Newcastle, Manchester, Leeds, the Midlands, and London and would travel up to 700 miles to exchange illicit goods.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/tip-of-the-spear-european-drug-cartel-uses-special-forces-command" target="_blank"><strong>Tip of the Spear: European drug cartel uses Special Forces commandos in its violent activities</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>In one series of messages he discussed the sale of 30 kilos of heroin split between locations in London, Leicester and Oxford.</p>
<p>Wednesday, at Leeds Crown Court, he was sentenced to 19 years and two months imprisonment after he had previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to transfer prohibited weapons (firearms) and conspiracy to supply heroin, cocaine and cannabis.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Operation Venetic </strong></span></p>
<p>The National Crime Agency (NCA) launched its investigation in 2020 as part of Operation Venetic – the UK law enforcement response to the takedown of encrypted global communications service <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/how-gangsters-try-and-fail-to-evade-government-surveillance" target="_blank">EncroChat</a>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-untouchables-how-britain-s-top-gangsters-rich-off-armed-robbe" target="_blank"><strong>The Untouchables: How Britain’s top gangsters got rich off armed robberies and smuggling tons of drugs</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>On 22 April 2020, Derrane was arrested in his van in the Tingley area of Leeds by NCA armed officers on suspicion of firearms and drugs offences. During a search of the van officers recovered a firearm that had been converted to fire fully automatic, as well as ammunition, class B drugs and £6000 cash.</p>
<p>On 2 July 2020, Alsi Vata, 26, who had conspired with Derrane to buy this firearm and other firearms was detained by NCA officers in the presence of the former Home Secretary as he left an apartment in Soho.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“I just need 2 bullets in a gun”</strong></span></p>
<p>Messages analysed in April 2020 as part of Operation Venetic provided evidence of their plans. Using the handle ‘Budplug’, Vata sent a message to Derrane in April 2020 requesting firearms.</p>
<p>Derrane, who used the handle ‘Big Corey’, responded, saying:</p>
<p>“They in Spain until we start sending again I can’t get em you got enough kill someone only need one in right place.”</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}10978635263,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="10978635263?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="710" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Michael Derrane (left) and Alsi Vata (right)</strong></em></p>
<p>In another message, Derrane references a dispute he has over drugs and money with another man, saying:</p>
<p>“‘That’s all they have to wait and I just need 2 bullets in a gun.”</p>
<p>Vata, from London, previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to transfer prohibited weapons (firearms), possession of a prohibited weapon (firearm) and conspiracy to supply cocaine and cannabis.</p>
<p>He was sentenced to 14 years and three months alongside Derrane Wednesday.</p>
<p>Adrian Barnard, the NCA SIO, said: “Messages clearly showed that Derrane was a dangerous person, whose access to weaponry gave him status among organized crime groups on a national scale. The levels of violence and exploitation that are linked to illegal drugs and firearms in the UK is undeniable and, not only are we going after the criminal kingpins, we’re disrupting those middle-tier criminals before they can make their way up the chain and cause even greater harm.”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Merseyside drug gang ran industrial scale amphetamine factory in Scotland
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/merseyside-drug-gang-ran-industrial-scale-amphetamine-factory-in
2022-12-20T09:41:27.000Z
2022-12-20T09:41:27.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10914408464?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>Four members of an organized crime group that ran an industrial scale amphetamine lab in Scotland, and trafficked heroin and cocaine, have been convicted after a National Crime Agency (NCA) investigation.</p>
<p>The organized crime group was based in Merseyside and run by 48-year-old kingpin Terrence Earle. He used the encrypted communications platform EncroChat to organize his operation and enlisted the help of subordinates Stanley Feerick, 68, and Stephen King, 48.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Scottish drug lab</strong></span></p>
<p>In December 2020, Lancashire Police seized more than 560 kilos of alpha-phenylacetoacetamide - a chemical used in the production of amphetamine - from the group. This would have been capable of producing around £1.1m worth of amphetamine at the lab in Scotland.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}10914408080,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="710" alt="10914408080?profile=RESIZE_710x" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Terrence Earle, Stanley Feerick, Lee Baxter and Stephen King</strong></em></p>
<p>It was found in a lorry which had been loaded from a warehouse at a caravan park in Weeton, Lancashire, on the orders of Feerick.</p>
<p>In March 2020, as the nation entered its first Covid 19 lockdown, the OCG arranged for boxes of alpha-phenylacetoacetamide which had been stored at the same warehouse to be loaded and driven to a garage in Motherwell.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-pablo-escobar-of-great-britain-s-cocaine-trade" target="_blank"><strong>The Pablo Escobar of Great Britain’s cocaine trade</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>EncroChat messages showed that Earle also oversaw the trafficking of heroin and cocaine from Scotland to Merseyside, and in the opposite direction, with the assistance of 48-year-old Lee Baxter, of Huyton, Liverpool.</p>
<p>In November 2020, Feerick, of Dovecot, Liverpool, met King, of Dumbarton in Lanark, south east of Glasgow, who supported the production of amphetamines.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Busted</strong></span></p>
<p>Shortly afterwards Feerick was arrested as he drove a lorry southbound on the M6 motorway and officers discovered a hold all, which was found to contain 2.9 kilos of heroin worth £300,000 and £20,000 in cash.</p>
<p>A search of Feerick’s home unearthed £9,370 in cash.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/foxtrot-one-one-is-down-the-braybrook-street-massacre" target="_blank"><strong>Foxtrot One One is Down: The Braybrook Street Massacre</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Further EncroChat messages showed that the gang was also involved in the trafficking of cocaine from Scotland to England.</p>
<p>NCA officers arrested Earle, Feerick Baxter and King in March last year.</p>
<p>Earle and Baxter pleaded guilty at Liverpool Crown Court on October 3 this year, with Feerick changing his plea to guilty on December 5 before he was due to stand trial. King was convicted by a jury on December 15 following an eight-day trial.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/top-4-stone-cold-gangsters-who-look-like-wimps" target="_blank"><strong>Looks can be deceiving: Look at Glasgow crime boss Paul Ferris</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>The men are due to be sentenced on January 18, 2023.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Takedown of EncroChat</strong></span></p>
<p>The NCA’s investigation formed part of Operation Venetic, the UK NCA-led law enforcement response to the takedown of the EncroChat service in July 2020.</p>
<p>NCA Branch Commander Richie Davies said: “Terence Earle’s criminal organization posed a serious threat to communities across Scotland and Merseyside. They were determined to make money from producing or supplying illegal drugs, despite knowing the risk those drugs posed to users, and to many others affected by the violence and exploitation fueled by the trade. Our investigation has dismantled their crime group, and demonstrates the NCA’s constant work to protect the public from the highest risk criminals impacting on the UK.”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
“I’m tired now” – One of Britain’s biggest drug smugglers guilty over international cocaine trafficking plot
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/i-m-tired-now-one-of-britain-s-most-wanted-fugitives-guilty-over
2022-11-10T11:48:43.000Z
2022-11-10T11:48:43.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10878963058?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>One of Great Britain’s biggest drug smugglers last week admitted his part in a large-scale international cocaine trafficking plot. 36-year-old Michael Paul Moogan, from Croxteth, Liverpool, went on the run in October 2013 and remained a fugitive for 8 years.</p>
<p>Moogan went into hiding after a raid on a Dutch cafe suspected of being a front for meetings between drug traffickers and cartels. The café, Café de Ketel in the city of Rotterdam, The Netherlands, was a business not open to the public. It could only be entered via a security system and was strictly for known faces.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Hundreds of kilos of cocaine a month</strong></span></p>
<p>Once inside, mountains of cocaine were just a call away. Moogan and his associates were involved in plans to import hundreds of kilos of cocaine from Latin America to Europe every month.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/profile-of-british-drug-boss-robert-the-voice-dawes-he-was-prepar" target="_blank"><strong>Profile of British drug boss Robert “The Voice” Dawes - “He was prepared to use extreme levels of violence”</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>He had the ability to obtain as much as €500,000 euros at a time to fund his cocaine deals from South American suppliers who would ship the coke to Belgium. He did not need to pay for deals in instalments as is common in large scale drugs supply. Instead, he could pay in lump sums via Iraqi nationals based in the United Kingdom.</p>
<p>Moogan told criminal contacts that he brought cocaine into Britain concealed in meat from Argentina. Evidence also showed he had the ability to bribe port officials to help ensure his drugs were not stopped.</p>
<p>As well as shipping from South America, Moogan used road transport networks stretching from Bulgaria to Latvia, Spain and Belgium to facilitate the movement of cocaine to the United Kingdom.</p>
<p>Moogan worked with 71-year-old Robert Hamilton, from Hale, Greater Manchester, and 57-year-old <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/fugitive-liverpool-drug-boss-robert-gerrard-turns-himself-in" target="_blank">Robert Gerard</a>, from Liverpool. Gerard is the second cousin of star football player Steven Gerard. He handed himself in to police after spending 3 years on the run. He claimed the pressure was too much. He pleaded guilty to drug trafficking charges and was jailed in 2017 for 14 years.</p>
<p>Hamilton was arrested during the raid on Café de Ketel and imprisoned for 8 years in 2014 after pleading guilty to drug charges.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>False identities in Dubai</strong></span></p>
<p>Moogan remained in hiding until April last year when he was arrested by police in Dubai. He was using numerous false identities to avoid capture. Dubai Police believe that after entering the United Arab Emirates using a different identity, he tried to avoid CCTV in an attempt to elude detectives who used their latest capabilities to track him down.</p>
<p>He had a German passport, and also a driver’s license and citizen card in the name of Michael Dier but displaying his own image.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/gangster-turned-cage-fighter-lee-murray" target="_blank"><strong>Profile of Gangster-turned-Cage Fighter Lee Murray</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>After being extradited to the United Kingdom, Moogan told the arresting officer: “You’re not going to have any trouble from me. I’m tired now. Get me up to Manny and get me in Cat A. I’m done now.”</p>
<p>Moogan was transported to police custody in Greater Manchester and on November 4 admitted conspiring to import Class A drugs. He will return to court to be sentenced at a date to be fixed.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“Moogan was a major figure in international drug dealing”</strong></span></p>
<p>“Moogan’s long overdue conviction is the result of years of investigation by the NCA and law enforcement partners in the UK, Europe and Middle East,” NCA Senior Investigating Officer Ben Rutter said. “We are particularly thankful to the Dubai Police for their hard work in tracking Moogan down and ensuring his return to the UK where he has admitted his guilt. Moogan was a major figure in international drug dealing.”</p>
<p>Moogan was the 86th person arrested under Operation Captura – an National Crime Agency (NCA) fugitive campaign run in conjunction with Crimestoppers.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Gang who ran firearms conversion workshop sentenced to prison
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gang-who-ran-firearms-conversion-workshop-sentenced-to-prison
2022-10-16T07:08:01.000Z
2022-10-16T07:08:01.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10842999696?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>Members of a British organized crime group who bought scores of blank firing handguns to convert into live weapons have been jailed on Tuesday for a total of almost 14 years. National Crime Agency (NCA) investigators established that 31-year-old Perhys Neale bought around 45 legal blank firing Turkish Retay 84FS pistols from gun stores in the Midlands area, including shops in Birmingham and Tamworth.</p>
<p>With original lethal purpose guns being illegal and relatively difficult to obtain, criminals wanting firearms often seek converted blank firing weapons. Each of the weapons bought by Neale cost around £100, but would have been worth at least £2,500 on the criminal market once converted to fire live ammunition.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/the-real-peaky-blinders-attacking-coppers-gambling-on-horses-figh"><strong>The Real Peaky Blinders: Attacking coppers, gambling on horses, fighting with fists and guns</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Neale was driven by accomplice Shaun Williams, 33, on multiple occasions to buy the weapons using cash, which were then passed to 31-year-old Christopher Watson, who himself bought one pistol.</p>
<p>The barrels were drilled into to enable them to fire live rounds, using a drill and fittings, before the weapons were coated in heat resistant black paint to make the blue side of the pistols appear more authentic.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Text message</strong></span></p>
<p>In one text message to his girlfriend, Neale said that he was getting four pistols converted, which would potentially make him around £9,000.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/manchester-drug-gang-planned-to-torture-and-rob-82-year-old-busin" target="_blank"><strong>Manchester drug gang planned to torture and rob 82-year-old businessman at his family home</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Watson and Williams were arrested on November 5 last year, after armed West Midlands Police officers – acting at the request of the NCA - descended on a white transit van travelling near ‘Spaghetti Junction’ in Birmingham. Watson was driving the vehicle at the time.</p>
<p>Two firearms which had been broken down into their constituent parts were found in the passenger foot well, along with a pack of 9mm ammunition.</p>
<p>NCA officers searched the three men’s homes in Birmingham. They found a Clarke Metal Worker drill and fittings in Watson’s house along with debris from the base of the drill, and a small cannabis farm at Neale’s flat.</p>
<p>The trio pleaded guilty at Birmingham Crown Court on June 8, and were sentenced at the same court on October 11. Watson was jailed five years and three months, Williams to four-and-a-half years and Neale to four years.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“Illegal firearms feed serious violence”</strong></span></p>
<p>NCA Branch Commander Mick Pope said: “Illegal firearms feed serious violence, intimidation and coercion in our communities. It is chilling to think that the dozens of blank firing weapons this gang bought could have been destined for organized criminals as viable handguns. Seizing such weapons, with the help of our partners at West Midlands Police, protects the public from this serious threat. I’ve no doubt more handguns would have been produced had we not intervened.”</p>
<p>It is illegal to modify or adapt top or side venting blank-firing firearms into viable weapons. The NCA works closely with industry, trade groups and retailers to prevent their availability and use by UK criminals, as well as with multiple partners overseas to prevent them from entering the UK supply chain, either through lawful or unlawful channels.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Man behind network that smuggled £104 million from Great Britain to Dubai in 1 year gets 9 years in prison
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/man-behind-network-that-smuggled-104-million-from-great-britain-t
2022-07-31T14:06:52.000Z
2022-07-31T14:06:52.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10736876288?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>The ringleader of a money laundering group which smuggled tens of millions of British pounds of criminal cash out of the United Kingdom has been jailed for 9 years on Thursday. 47-year-old Abdullah Mohammed Ali Bin Beyat Alfalasi arranged travel for a network of couriers, who between them smuggled £104 million from Great Britain to Dubai in just 11 months.</p>
<p>Alfalasi, an Emirati national, was arrested by National Crime Agency (NCA) officers at a flat in Belgravia during a visit to the United Kingdom in December last year. Four of his couriers have already been convicted as part of the NCA’s operation.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Drug profits</strong></span></p>
<p>The cash was believed to be profits from drug dealing, and the couriers would pack hundreds of thousands of pounds at a time into suitcases. They were each paid £3,000 - £8,000 per trip depending on how much cash they were smuggling.</p>
<p>Overall, the group took at least 10 percent cut from the money smuggled, so between them are likely to have made in excess of £12 million from the venture.</p>
<p>Alfalasi made multiple cash trips himself between Dubai and the UK, from November 2019 to March 2020. His name appeared on letters bearing the name Omnivest Gold Trading LLC, which was used to cover cash declarations made by the couriers. His phone number was also connected to their flight bookings.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/one-of-britain-s-most-wanted-drug-traffickers-caught-in-dubai" target="_blank"><strong>One of Britain’s most wanted drug traffickers caught in Dubai</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>The network collected cash from criminal groups around the UK and took it to counting houses, usually rented apartments in Central London.</p>
<p>The wads of bank notes were then vacuum packed and separated into suitcases which would each contain around £500,000, weighing around 40 kilos. Each would be sprayed with coffee or air fresheners in an effort to prevent them being found by Border Force detection dogs.</p>
<p>The couriers flew business class due to the extra luggage allowance.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“Fuels violence and insecurity around the world”</strong></span></p>
<p>NCA senior investigating officer Ian Truby said: “This money laundering network smuggled astronomical sums of money out of the UK, and is one of the largest we’ve ever investigated. Cash is the lifeblood of organized crime groups, which they re-invest into activities such as drug trafficking which fuels violence and insecurity around the world.”</p>
<p>International money laundering networks use cash smuggling, cryptocurrencies, and banking systems to move billions of pounds of dirty money each year. This cash can be derived from the drugs trade, fraud, other illegal commodities, and even associated with terrorism and conflicts around the world.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-untouchables-how-britain-s-top-gangsters-rich-off-armed-robbe" target="_blank"><strong>The Untouchables: How Britain’s top gangsters got rich off armed robberies and smuggling tons of drugs</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>“This is one of the largest money laundering cases the CPS has ever prosecuted to date,” John Werhun of the CPS said. “A colossal amount of dirty money, totaling £104 million, was transported to Dubai under Alfalasi’s instructions. The evidence against Alfalasi was overwhelming, with invoices, declaration documents and images of cash-filled suitcases, pointing to his culpability.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>The network</strong></span></p>
<p>Among Alfalasi’s couriers were 55-year-old Nicola Esson, from Leeds, who was arrested following NCA raids in May 2021, and 29-year-old Muhammad Ilyas, from Slough, who was apprehended in February 2020.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/british-secret-agents-have-a-license-to-commit-crime" target="_blank"><strong>British secret agents have a license to commit crime</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Esson travelled from Heathrow to Dubai on three occasions in August and September 2020, checking in 19 suitcases with a combined weight of almost half a ton. She returned a few days after each trip with the same baggage items, which weighed significantly less each time.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}10736879856,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="300" alt="10736879856?profile=RESIZE_400x" /></a>Ilyas was arrested by NCA officers at Heathrow Airport after arriving on a flight from Dubai. He had checked in four suitcases at the airport ten days earlier, one of which had gone missing, and declared almost £1.5 million in cash to Dubai Customs. The missing suitcase was subsequently found by Border Force officers, and contained £431,360 in cash.</p>
<p>Esson, Ilyas and Alfalasi pleaded guilty to money laundering charges at Isleworth Crown Court on 18 May, 27 May and 27 June respectively. Alfalasi (right) was sentenced at the same court on Thursday, with the remaining two due to be sentenced at a later date.</p>
<p>Two other couriers linked to the same network have already been jailed following investigations by the NCA.</p>
<p>Tara Hanlon, 31, from Leeds, was detained by Border Force at Heathrow in October 2020 as she attempted to leave the country with suitcases containing almost £2 million. She later admitted smuggling another £3.5 million out of the UK in other trips, and was sentenced to 34 months imprisonment in July 2021.</p>
<p>Czech national Zdenek Kamaryt, 39, was also stopped at Heathrow in November 2020. He was attempting to board a flight to Dubai carrying £1.4 million. Kamaryt pleaded guilty to 3 counts of money laundering and was sentenced to 34 months imprisonment in March last year.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
“I want you to move 50 kilos a week, don’t talk about 1” – London crime boss gets 25 years for running drug ring from prison
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/i-want-you-to-move-50-kilos-a-week-don-t-talk-about-1-london-crim
2022-04-23T15:30:25.000Z
2022-04-23T15:30:25.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10434433685?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>Who said prison is the end of the road for a criminal? For most it is either the beginning of a long criminal career or simply a change of venue. Case in point 42-year-old Darryl Tawiah, of Southwark London, who was already serving an 18-year sentence for narcotics and weapons trafficking when he was arrested and charged by National Crime Agency officers last year for organizing drug deals and money laundering from his cell.</p>
<p>Tawiah (photo above) was jailed for 25 years on Wednesday alongside associates who helped him fix deals on the outside and launder the profits. He frequently used phones in prison to contact a drug supplier based in the Netherlands, who himself had previously been convicted for importing cocaine after an NCA investigation.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/irish-kinahan-cartel-sanctioned-by-u-s-treasury-dea-offers-5-mill" target="_blank"><strong>Irish Kinahan Cartel sanctioned by U.S. Treasury – DEA offers $5 million bounty for arrest of bosses</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Following his early release from prison, the Dutch drugs trafficker was deported to the Netherlands and became the subject of a separate Dutch investigation. Conversations captured between the two showed Tawiah was sourcing cocaine wholesale and arranging their onward distribution and sale.</p>
<p>Working with people within the UK and the Netherlands, Tawiah’s group is believed to have been behind at least two tons of drugs imported into the UK and sold across London and the South East.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“I need to get more money in”</strong></span></p>
<p>In one conversation the Dutch supplier told Tawiah: “I want you to move 50 [kilos] a week, don’t talk to me about one”, to which Tawiah replied, “No problem Bro…now that it is good, everybody is calling…..I need to get more money in…”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>WATCH: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/video/the-power-of-the-mocro-mafia-cocaine-and-the-netherlands" target="_blank"><strong>The power of the Mocro Mafia - Cocaine and the Netherlands</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Further conversations showed Tawiah talking about buying cocaine at bulk prices and that he had a desire to sell ‘coffee’ when he left prison, which is slang for heroin. He also asked the supplier if he had ever heard of “2C” because “everybody’s asking for it in the West End, Knightsbridge, Mayfair, Chelsea…”.</p>
<p>2C was a reference to liquid GHB, which has been used in instances of ‘date rape’.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Outside connections</strong></span></p>
<p>Tawiah controlled a number of people on the outside, one of which was 37-year-old Steven Johnson, of Farlington Place, London. He took delivery of the drugs on Tawiah’s instructions and distributed them across London.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}10434435494,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="10434435494?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="710" /></a><em><strong>From left to right: Ali Reza Shokrolahi, Rosemond Agyemang, Dorian Vaciulis, Faisal Guled, Steven Johnson, Darryl Tawiah</strong></em></p>
<p>59-year-old Rosemond Agyemang was a courier handling the cash side of the operation, and helped to launder it through bank accounts. She also made various cash payments to the Dutch supplier’s people in the UK.</p>
<p>She was arrested outside Oval station in London in July 2019 and was found to be carrying thousands in cash at the time. At the time of her arrest she was on her way to meet Dorian Vaciulis, a 34-year-old from Feltham, London, who was working for the Dutch supplier and responsible for collecting both cash and drugs.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-boys-from-bethnal-green-how-the-infamous-kray-twins-ruled-the" target="_blank"><strong>The Boys from Bethnal Green: How the infamous Kray Twins ruled the London underworld</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>He was in regular contact with co-conspirator Ali Reza Shokrolahi. Aged 41, Shokrolahi, also from London, was operating as a lorry driver for the group and was linked to at least 30 kilograms of cocaine seized at the UK border.</p>
<p>Tawiah, Vaciulis, Johnson, Agyemang and other alleged co-conspirators were arrested in March last year and were charged with various offences relating to Class A drugs and money laundering.</p>
<p>As the investigation continued, a further man was identified and arrested for his links to the group. 34-year-old Faisal Guled, a Dutch national living in Camden, London, worked for the Dutch supplier and was operating a county line selling drugs across London and Northampton.</p>
<p>On Wednesday, April 20, Tawiah, Johnson, Vaciulis and Guled were sentenced collectively to 70 years in prison after pleading guilty following a newton hearing. Agyemang was given a one year sentence at the same court last year. Shokrolahi fled while on bail and was not present at the hearing.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Albanian drug supply "fixer" who operated in England jailed
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/albanian-drug-supply-fixer-who-operated-in-england-jailed
2022-02-19T09:10:42.000Z
2022-02-19T09:10:42.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10134298880?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>An Albanian drug supplier who arranged cocaine deals within the United Kingdom worth almost £1.4 million has been jailed for 10 years on Tuesday. 35-year-old Taulant Stoica (photo above) was identified by British police as the fixer behind a number of drug deals in London and Bristol, arranged on encrypted messaging platform EncroChat.</p>
<p>Stoica used the EncroChat handle ‘Palefog’ to organize the handover of drugs by fellow Albanians Muhamet Quosja and Eduard Hadjini. They acted as runners for Stoica and were jailed for 10 years and three years respectively last year.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/albanian-run-cocaine-pipeline-from-latin-america-to-europe-shut-d" target="_blank">Albanian-run cocaine pipeline from Latin America to Europe shut down</a> – 45 arrests in 6 countries</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>30-year-old Quosja was arrested October 13, 2020, when he was found in possession of £23,000 in cash. A handgun with 20 rounds of ammunition and 11 kilos of cocaine, with a street value of £1.1 million, were subsequently recovered from his home in Ilford.</p>
<p><strong><span style="font-size:14pt;">“Daku”</span> </strong></p>
<p>Quosja’s phone was searched and contained a contact called ‘Daku’ (an Albanian term for friend) which matched Stoica’s number. Messages show an exchange between the two men, with Stoica directing Quosja to a postcode to handover cocaine.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/profile-albanian-drug-boss-besnik-sinanaj" target="_blank"><strong>Profile: Albanian drug boss Besnik Sinanaj</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>39-year-old Hadjini, who lived close to Stoica in Abbey Wood, was arrested on April 1, 2021 after police followed him in his car to Bristol. It had been loaded with one kilo of cocaine which he was due to handover to 28-year-old Thomas Scarrett. Hadjini was arrested alongside fellow dealer Sokol Ajazi around a month after the Bristol exchange.</p>
<p>Officers searched a garage, seizing three more kilos of cocaine. The combined value of these drugs, plus an additional two kilos Hadjini handed to another dealer the previous month, could have fetched around £360,000 if sold on the streets of Great Britain.</p>
<p>Ajazi and Scarrett were both arrested and later sentenced to 5 years and 2 months and six years respectively.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Three phones and thousands in cash</strong></span></p>
<p>Stoica himself was detained by police near his home on June 30, 2021. He had three mobile phones and more than £4,000 in his possession. A further £12,000 was recovered from his house. He was subsequently hit with drug and money laundering charges.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/realism-is-key-in-bronx-based-albanian-gangster-as-it-depicts-war" target="_blank">Realism is key in Bronx-based “Albanian Gangster”</a> as it depicts “war-torn psyche fused with honor code”</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>He admitted these offences at Woolwich Crown Court on October 6 last year and was jailed for 10 years at the same court on February 15, 2022.</p>
<p>“Stoica was pulling the strings behind these drugs deals which, had they not been prevented by OCP officers, would have resulted in cocaine flooding our streets,” Andrew Tickner, from the Organised Crime Partnership, said.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Foxtrot One One is Down: The Braybrook Street Massacre
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/foxtrot-one-one-is-down-the-braybrook-street-massacre
2022-01-02T12:06:03.000Z
2022-01-02T12:06:03.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/9975541466?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By Thom L. Jones for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>Formed in 1829, the London Metropolitan Police Service (universally known simply as The Met,) whose mantra has always been policing by consent rather than force, has known the horror of multiple police officers killed in the line of duty at the same time on four occasions in its history.</p>
<p>On a balmy August afternoon in 1966, the third such atrocity will take place on a quiet North London street far from the madding crowds that fill the city’s numerous boroughs.</p>
<p>East Acton is to the north and west of the famous Notting Hill area and just a few miles from Wembley Stadium, where on July 31, England will win its first, and so far, only Fifa World Cup football match, beating Germany 4-2.</p>
<p>The area is also home to Wormwood Scrubs Prison, one of Britain's most notorious penal institutions. And Braybrook Street, which fronts the southern boundary of the Scrubs, 200 acres of free common land which was then, used as it is to-day, by the children who attended the nearby Old Oak Primary School to enjoy as a play space and above all, use it to play football.</p>
<p>The street is about to become famous, for all the wrong reasons.</p>
<p>The swinging sixties in England is a period filled with not just pop groups like The Beatles, Stones, Kinks, Animals and dozens more. In London, Carnaby street fashions, some outrageous and extreme, are generating their own world of excitement. Mary Quant emerges as a revolutionary clothing designers for the young, changing the way women will dress for ever. James Bond has appeared on movie screens world-wide, generating four box-office smash hits by 1966. (1)</p>
<p>And the criminal gangs of London are also on a roller. They were big and small, scattered across many of the boroughs. To the north of The River Thames they are dominated by the <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-boys-from-bethnal-green-how-the-infamous-kray-twins-ruled-the" target="_blank">Krays</a>. and to the south, by the Richardson brothers.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-boys-from-bethnal-green-how-the-infamous-kray-twins-ruled-the" target="_blank"><strong>The Boys From Bethnal Green</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>One of the smallest, will do the biggest damage. In human terms at least. Midafternoon on Friday, August 12, three unarmed police officers will confront their worst nightmare when a routine traffic stop turns into a fire-storm with them as the victims.</p>
<p>Since their inception, the police in Britain have gone about their job unarmed, with guns, at least. The first armoured vests were not issued until 1980, and even today, the street patrol officer does not carry lethal weapons. Although they are trained in their use and there are multiple armed-offenders squads on standby in all major cities across the United Kingdom. In 2016 The Met although 90% of its officers go unarmed, carried out 3,300 deployments using firearms but didn’t fire a single shot at a suspect. In America during the same period, 1092 people died by gunshot wounds involving the police (2)</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>The Criminals</strong></span></p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9975532454,RESIZE_180x180{{/staticFileLink}}" width="145" alt="9975532454?profile=RESIZE_180x180" /></a>On this August day of mayhem, Harry Roberts (right) is a month into his thirtieth year, Five-ten, medium build, his hair is thick and black and always tousled in the pictures of that time. Arching eyebrows, a smirking face displaying an arrogance of self-belief and eyes that look beyond the uncertainty of life. Born and raised in Wanstead, Essex, his parents ran a public house called <em>The George</em> before moving to North London and buying a cafe. Apart from two years serving in the British Army, in The Rifle Brigade, fighting in Kenya and Malaya, he has been a criminal most of his adult life. He spent time in Borstal (young offenders detention) and in prison for attacking and almost killing a seventy-eight year old man in the 1950s.</p>
<p>After his release in November, 1963, although he had tried to go straight, starting up a small, construction company, it all fell to pieces and he was back into robbing and thieving to pay the bills.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/a-death-in-london" target="_blank"><strong>A Death in London</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>He and his new partner, Lillian Perry, live in a flat in Wymering Road, in Maida Vale that belonged to one of Robert’s few friends, a man called Colin Howard (who had been a witness at Robert’s only marriage in 1958, subsequently dissolved by divorce,) who was then serving time in Wormwood Scrubs Prison. His wife, June, welcomed Perry and Roberts who could help support her until her husband was released. </p>
<p>Sometime in 1965, Roberts meets up with a Greek-Cypriot somewhere near Shaftesbury Avenue in London’s West End, and buys three handguns and ammunition from him for ninety pounds.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9975532478,RESIZE_180x180{{/staticFileLink}}" width="140" alt="9975532478?profile=RESIZE_180x180" /></a>Then he meets Jack Witney (right) in a pub on the Portobello Road in Notting Hill.</p>
<p>Seven years older that Roberts, he was a poor excuse for a gangster. His criminal record was for multiple counts of dishonesty. He lived in a ground-floor flat at 10 Fernhead Road in Maida Hill, just to the north of Notting Hill, with his wife, another Lillian. Ironically, he had also served, years before Roberts in the British Army, but had gone absent without leave in 1951. At the time of his arrest in 1966, he was still listed as a deserter, although it seems to have given up on him.</p>
<p>Roberts will later claim that Witney is the alpha in their relationship, setting up the scores, organizing the operations, the muggings, robberies, the planner to his muscle. Which seems disingenuous to say the least. Roberts was a lot smarter than Witney and a lot more dangerous in a physical sense. He had soldiered in Malaya, fighting the communist insurgency, and had risen to the rank of corporal, leading men in action, organizing ambushes, controlling fire-fights, maybe killing people.</p>
<p>If anyone was picking targets to rob, it was Harry Roberts.</p>
<p>His landlady, June Howards, introduces Roberts and Witney to the man who will become gang member number three, in a night club called Le Monde. <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-left" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9975532694,RESIZE_180x180{{/staticFileLink}}" width="145" alt="9975532694?profile=RESIZE_180x180" /></a>His name is John Duddy (left).</p>
<p>A small, tubby man with a drinking problem, he was born in Glasgow, the son of a policeman, in December 1928. From school he drifted into dead-end jobs and was in and out of prison until 1948, when he reformed, joined the British Army, and like Roberts, served in Malaya. A professional soldier he spent seven years in service, mostly overseas. Marries in 1949 to Teresa Ann, their have four daughters over the years, moving back and forward between London and Glasgow before settling in a council flat in Ladbroke Grove, in Kensington. When he meets up with his two new friends in crime, he is out of work, broke and desperate for money.</p>
<p>The three thugs who make up this disparate gang, sailing their own river of no return, had at least two thing in common: They’d all served in the British Army, and they were unquestionably a bunch of also-rans in life’s grand parade.</p>
<p>Considering they had only been working together over a relatively short period of time, it was interesting that they lived so close to each other, From Roberts place in Maida Vale, through Maida Hill where Witney lived to Ladbroke Grove the home of Duddy was less than two miles by the quickest route. </p>
<p>If it’s true that no one is as dangerous as a man who has nothing to lose, Harry Roberts was abut to confirm that as a given as the day unfolded. In a way, Duddy and Witney will be victims of circumstances, drawn into a whirlpool of violence beyond their control.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>The Police Officers</strong></span></p>
<p>Christopher Head, born in Devon in 1935, joined the police as a cadet at the age of seventeen. In 1952 he entered the Royal Air Force to serve his two years mandatory national service and in June 1958 he joined The Met and was based at Fulham Police Station, one of the three that made up F-Division. He transferred to the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in 1964 and by 1966 was a sergeant assigned to Shepherd’s Bush station. He was a single man whose only interest outside the job, seemed to be supporting Chelsea Football Club.</p>
<p>Born in Hertfordshire in 1941, David Wombwell joined the Met in 1963, the year after he married his sweetheart, Gillian Hague. They had two young children, a boy and a girl. As a temporary Detective-Constable, he was assigned to work Q-cars to gain experience.</p>
<p>Geoffrey Fox grew up in Surrey, in South London, where he was born in 1924. Joining the London police in 1950, he had been based at Shepherd’s Bush for most of his career. He knew the area, literary like the back of his hand having worked it first as a foot-patrol man, then a Q-car driver. (3)</p>
<p>The Met rated him a Class-1 driver, the only ones allowed to drive Q-cars, He was married and had three children.</p>
<p>The three officers based at the 253 Uxbridge Road police station in Shepherds Bush worked as a team manning a Q-car covering F-Division. Sometimes referred to within the force as “The Murder Area,” it covers an area enclosing the boroughs of Hammersmith, Fulham and Shepherds Bush which in 1966 had a population of about 100,000. (4)</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9975534089,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="710" alt="9975534089?profile=RESIZE_710x" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Officers Fox, Wombwell and Head</strong></em></p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>August 12, 1966</strong></span></p>
<p>Tango One-One is the call sign for Q-car, plate number GGW876. It’s a blue Triumph 2000 based at Shepherd’s Bush. It’s crew log onto duty at 9am. They know they are taking their “governor,” Detective Inspector Kenneth Cook, to Marylebone Magistrates Court, about four miles to the east of their station, and have to drop him off there along with a small pile of evidence boxes he needs to present as evidence in a case to be tried, by 10 am. The rest of the morning is routine surveillance work, cruising their area. The three men return to the station about one for their lunch break, which they take most days at a pub a few hundred yards down the road.</p>
<p>This same day, the three villains are trawling the streets of North London looking to steal a car. They intended to carry out a robbery at an engineering works in Northolt, a few miles north-west of Acton, on the outskirts of London. Whitney is driving his beat-up Vauxhall Standard Estate, also a shade of blue, plate number PGT726.</p>
<p>Robert sits next to him, Duddy in the back. Between the front seats is a holdall containing the three guns that belong to Roberts. They are a .38 Enfield service revolver, a .38 Colt Special and a German 9mm Luger P08 semi-automatic, that had been made in 1918. They are all loaded.</p>
<p>Some time earlier, the gang had paid for a set of plates, JJJ285D. and intended to fit these to the car they steal in order to confuse the police if they investigate. They are looking for a Ford Cortina, one of the most popular makes in Britain at this time. They find one, late in the morning but can’t force it. They take a break for lunch also in a pub, The Clay Pigeon in Eastcote, about ten miles to the north and west of their final destination, and then continue their search for the car they need to steal. </p>
<p>Their journey takes them along The Harrow Road, then south on the A4000 through Willsden Junction, down Old Oak Lane, then making a left onto Oak Common Road, heading towards East Acton Underground Station, where they hope a commuter may have left what they are looking for, parked for the day by the roadside. As they drive down Erconwald Street, they overtake a vehicle parked near the station. It is Foxtrot One One.</p>
<p>Everyone is five minutes and less than three hundred yards from their own Armageddon.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-untouchables-how-britain-s-top-gangsters-rich-off-armed-robbe" target="_blank">The Untouchables</a>: How Britain’s top gangsters got rich off armed robberies and smuggling tons of drugs</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Detective Sergeant Head is making a telephone call at 3:10 pm from a police box outside the station to confirm with his boss DI Cook that they will pick him up at the courthouse in less than thirty minutes. Perhaps he notices the battered Vauxhall drive by with three men. One man okay. Two maybe. Three cause for suspicion. It’s been suggested that the Q-car driver, Fox, may have recognized Whitney, They had lived in the same neighborhood some years before. Good cops spot villains like hawks see trout swimming underwater.</p>
<p>“Give them a tug,” says Head getting back into the car, meaning pull them over.</p>
<p>The police car follows the Vauxhall as it turns left into Braybrook Street and they flag it down outside house number 61. Fox pulls his Triumph forward and stops in the middle of the road. Children playing on the field stop their games and watch, wondering. What’s going on?</p>
<p>In the Vauxhall, Roberts looks at his mates and says, “It’s The Old Bill.” (5)</p>
<p>It is all over in seconds.</p>
<p>Wombwell and Head get out of the Q-car and walk back to the vehicle they have stopped, the young constable moving to the driver’s side and the sergeant over to the passenger side. David has his notebook and pencil in hand ready to note anything that might be relevant. He asks Whitney about the expired tax disc on the windshield, checking insurance, stuff like that. The sergeant moving to the back of car points to the bag between the seats asking what the contents are. Nothing, he is told, just towels, overalls, stuff like that. Show me what’s under that, he orders. Both officers start shouting at the car occupants to comply with their requests.</p>
<p>Roberts was already holding the Luger on his lap, under his jacket. From the back seat, Duddy shouts out “Let the slag have it.” Roberts leans across Whitney, shouts “Fuck it,” and shoots Wombwell in the face, under the left eye, killing him instantly. The officer falls back onto the road, the notebook fluttering in the wind like a downed pigeon, his death grip tight on the pencil. And there he lies there in a casual repose, his ankles crossed, his eyes staring forever at the confusion of sudden and unexpected end of life.</p>
<p>Christopher Head shouting “No!” “No!” starts back towards the Q-car as Roberts leaps out leveling the Luger and firing at the officer. The gun jambs, and Roberts frantically slides the toggle bar back to release the blockage and then fires again towards the sergeant.</p>
<p>Roberts is shouting. “Come on. Come on.”</p>
<p>Duddy leaps from the rear of the Vauxhall pulling out a revolver, the .38 Enfield and running forward, starts shooting at the police car. His first shot dissolves the nearside rear window. The second goes into the Triumph and out the windscreen, The third, smashes into the left side of Constable Fox’s head, killing him instantly. As he slumps forward his last convulsions rams the car over the body of Sergeant Head, who had collapsed in front, already gone from the last shot from Roberts. The Q-car sits there, lodged over the body, its rear wheels spinning madly.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: Smirking and laughing as his victims died violent deaths - Profile: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/smirking-and-laughing-as-his-victims-died-violent-deaths-profile" target="_blank"><strong>Irish mob hitman “Fat Freddie” Thompson</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>The children on the Scrubs stare at the panorama of chaos, open-mouthed, disbelieving. One of them, James Newman, aged 9, will be a star witness for the police and the media. Standing on the corner of Braybrook Street, he thought he was watching a film being made</p>
<p>The two gunmen rush back to the Vauxhall, and the driver, in panic, reverses madly back down Braybrook Street, careering into Erconwold Street, almost smashing into a car turning left. The driver, Bryan Deacon, rushes to a nearby butcher shop and dials 999, the emergency number, informing them of what has happened and giving a full description of the killer's car and the plate number.</p>
<p>The law descended on Braybrook Street in their dozens. Ironically, the first police officer to arrive on the scene is Constable Sidney Seager, He was a friend of Geoffrey Fox. Had been his best-man at his wedding twenty years before. History has not recorded his reaction, and he was himself, killed two days later in a traffic accident while on duty.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9975535292,RESIZE_710x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="647" alt="9975535292?profile=RESIZE_710x" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Braybrook Street.</strong></em></p>
<p>A special investigation squad code-named, “Operation Shepherd,” is set up under Detective Superintendent Richard Chitty, and soon 60 detectives are scouring London for the killers.</p>
<p>Paradoxically, the Vauxhall Estate car at the center of the inquiry, is found in garage 103 Railway Arch, behind Tinworth Street, in of all places, the borough of Vauxhall, South London. A witness, William Keeley identified Whitney as the man who had rented the garage from him.</p>
<p>Whitney is arrested and taken to Holloway Road Police Station and questioned through the day and into the night. As the only one that afternoon who had not fired a gun, it dawns on him that his only salvation might be to cooperate. So he does. In the early hours of August 14 he makes a full confession of what happened. The net goes out for the other two.</p>
<p>Their addresses are established and police officers move in to arrest them.</p>
<p>Duddy has fled London on the Sunday after the shootings, and moved back to Glasgow, holing up in a tatty apartment above a shop at 257 Stevenson Street in the district of Calton. He is dobbed in by his brother, arrested and returned to London. He had been on the run for five days. There is no sign of Harry Roberts.</p>
<p>Catching a Greenline Bus and equipped with survival gear, stashed in a rucksack, he disappears into London’s greater metropolitan area. He becomes the subject of the biggest manhunt ever mounted by the Met.</p>
<p>After a three-month chase, he is found, hiding under a straw-pile in a barn on a farm near Bishop Stortford, north of Epping Forest, (20 miles east of Braybrook Street,) where he had first vanished, living off the land, hiding like a ferret in his hole among the 6000 acres of trees and shrubs..</p>
<p>The three men go on trial for the multiple murders at the Old Bailey in London on December 6 and are found guilty. They are sentenced to life with a minimum non-parole period of 30 years. </p>
<p>John Duddy dies of natural causes in 1981 while serving his sentence at Parkhurst Prison, on The Isle of Wight. We don’t know what they are because they are never disclosed.</p>
<p>Jack Witney is released in 1991 after serving 29 years and in 1999 is battered to death by his flat-mate, Nigel Evans, during an argument over who washes the dirty dishes.</p>
<p>Roberts stays in prison, year after year. Decade after decade, living out his life in a seven by eleven cell in different prisons across England. He tries to escape over twenty times before resigning himself in 1976, to a lifetime of incarceration.</p>
<p>His chance of parole is scuppered in 2001 when he is involved in a scandal connected to a work release program he attends. Although the details are never officially revealed, a woman running the scheme is terrorized by Roberts, and shades of <em>The Godfather</em>, an animal is beheaded!</p>
<p>He is serving time in Littlehey Prison in Cambridgeshire when his discharge is finally approved by the British Home Office. In another great irony, this was a correction center built in 1988 on the site of the old Gaynes Hall Borstal, where Roberts served his first sentence, for criminal assault.</p>
<p>Going around and coming around works a charm in the circus of criminality.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9975538265,RESIZE_400x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="258" alt="9975538265?profile=RESIZE_400x" /></a>He (right) finally leaves his prison life behind in November 2014, released on license and was last heard of living in Peterborough, a small, country town, about 100 miles north of London. (6)</p>
<p>“We shot them because they were going to nick us and we didn’t want to go to jail for 15 years,” Roberts told the Guardian’s Nick Davies in a prison interview in 1993. “We were professional criminals. We don’t react the same way as ordinary people. The police aren’t like real people to us. They’re strangers. They’re the enemy. And you don’t feel remorse for killing a stranger.</p>
<p>“I do feel sorry for what we did to their families. I do. But it’s like people I killed in Malaya when I was in the army. You don’t feel remorse.”</p>
<p>In an interview with a newspaper reporter in 1993, after having served twenty-seven years, he finished off by saying, “Prison.....mentally. I mean, it’s a terrible thing they do to people. You know? I want to say to them ‘Why are you still punishing me?’ I don’t know the answer.”</p>
<p>He only needed to look into a mirror for the answer.</p>
<p>--</p>
<p><em>The following sources were used in researching this story:</em></p>
<p><em>Russell-Pavier, The Shepherds Bush Murders: Random House. London. 2016</em></p>
<p><em>Barton, Geoffrey, Harry Roberts and Foxtrot One One: Waterside Press. London. 2017</em></p>
<p><em>Guardian 2 February, 1993.</em></p>
<p><em>Independent 9 October, 2011.</em></p>
<p><em>Guardian 23 October, 2014.</em></p>
<p><em>Daily Mail 26 October, 2014.</em></p>
<p><em>BBC News 12 November, 2014.</em></p>
<p><em>Mirror Online 1 August, 2016.</em></p>
<p><em>Daily Record 12 December, 2016.</em></p>
<p><em>Roger (Jan) Meecham.html 29 January 2017.</em></p>
<p><em>(1) The term Swinging Sixties may have first appeared as part of the April 15, 1966 cover of Time Magazine, published in America.</em></p>
<p><em>(2) NBC News. March 24, 2017.</em></p>
<p><em>3) Q-cars are special police vehicles used by The Met’s CID officers. Outwardly a standard, four-door saloon, they are modified with V-8 engines, special gearing, brakes and suspension and can only be driven by highly qualified drivers. Used as roving crime seekers, they work across the entire metropolitan area of London. The term, in use since the early 1930s, refers to Q-ships employed during the First World War by Britain’s Royal Navy to counteract attacks of German submarines on merchant ships. Sailing as nondescript vessels, they were heavily armed under camouflage to entice the enemy vessel up close, to then blast them out of the water. Initially, they were mainly based in Queenstown, Ireland, hence their naming.</em></p>
<p><em>4) Between 1959 and 1965 eight women were murdered in the Hammersmith area by a serial killer who became known as “Jack the Stripper” as all of his victims were found nude. The case was closed when the two leading suspects died, one by suicide and the other either that way or murder.</em></p>
<p><em>The case was closed and there were no further murders.</em></p>
<p><em>(5) The Bill or Old Bill is a London slang expression for police. No one knows its origin, although there are dozens of attempted definitions.</em></p>
<p><em>(6) Under English Law, probation after completing a prison service is a finite period. License can and often is, issued as an infinite one. The prisoner can be recalled at any time, for any reason to continue their original term.</em></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/thom-l-jones-mob-corner">Thom L. Jones' Mob Corner</a> or the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">Organized Crime in Europe section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Thom L. Jones & Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
London-based gangsters caught with guns sentenced to prison
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/london-based-gangsters-caught-with-guns-sentenced-to-prison
2021-10-04T08:01:22.000Z
2021-10-04T08:01:22.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/9640531052?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>Guns are a serious business. Always, but especially in Europe where laws are much more strict. Of course, when it comes to guns and organized crime authorities around the world tend to work by a zero tolerance policy. Three members of a London-based crime organization found that out on Friday.</p>
<p>39-year-old Artem Kuts and 40-year-old Oliver Mark were arrested as part of a National Crime Agency (NCA) investigation into the supply of firearms. Following a seven-day trial they were found guilty. On Friday, they were sentenced to 15 years and 8 years in prison respectively.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9640531301,RESIZE_584x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="500" alt="9640531301?profile=RESIZE_584x" /></a><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Surveillance</strong></span></p>
<p>NCA surveillance teams watched as Kuts left his home carrying a brown paper bag on October 12 last year, and got into a black BMW 5 Series registered to Mark. A third man, 26-year-old Alexander Georgiev (also known as Ernis Piranej), was seen getting in and out of the same car several times carrying the brown paper bag. He pleaded guilty at an earlier date and was jailed for 6 years.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9640531869,RESIZE_584x{{/staticFileLink}}" width="508" alt="9640531869?profile=RESIZE_584x" /></a><em><strong>Photo: From left to right: Kuts, Mark, Georgiev</strong></em></p>
<p>Armed officers descended on the black car and found the bag in the rear passenger footwell. It contained a Russian brand Baikal self-loading pistol and eight rounds of Makarov ammunition. Mark and Kuts were both arrested for possession of a firearm.</p>
<p>Georgiev was arrested for conspiring to supply a firearm minutes later, as he attempted to flee in a blue BMW.</p>
<p>Officers then searched Kuts’ home and found two more Baikals and 14 rounds of ammunition, which had been hidden in the garden. They had been packaged heavily and wedged in the corner between the wall and a garden storage unit.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“It is only right they should serve long jail sentences”</strong></span></p>
<p>“Illegal firearms drive serious violence, intimidation and coercion in our communities,” Jacque Beer, NCA Regional Head of Investigations, said. “Seizing handguns like the ones found [here], with the help of our partners at the Metropolitan Police Service, protects the public from this grave threat. The NCA works tirelessly to stop criminals like Kuts, Mark and Georgiev obtaining firearms and it is only right they should serve long jail sentences for their crimes.”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p></div>
Manchester drug gang planned to torture and rob 82-year-old businessman at his family home
https://gangstersinc.org/blog/manchester-drug-gang-planned-to-torture-and-rob-82-year-old-busin
2021-08-06T06:14:15.000Z
2021-08-06T06:14:15.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/9386995661?profile=RESIZE_400x&width=400"></div><div><p>By <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a> Editors</p>
<p>Six British men have been convicted after a National Crime Agency (NCA) investigation uncovered their role in the supply of cocaine and a separate plot to torture and rob a Manchester man’s home and business. On Tuesday they were found guilty after a seven week trial.</p>
<p>The group, from Manchester, Warrington and Hertfordshire were all involved in supplying drugs worth almost a quarter of a million pounds. They included: William Skillen; Wayne Simmonds; Chris Sammon; Gerard Boyle; Gary Betts; John Sammon. Pictured above.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“You’ve got to give him a f****** slap”</strong></span></p>
<p>Five of the men also conspired to commit a robbery that would include threatening to tie up the victims and cut off the ear of one of them. The NCA captured covert recordings of 57-year-old Gary Betts last year as he told associates that he had a “nice job” that would be “plenty of dough”.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/one-of-britain-s-most-wanted-drug-traffickers-caught-in-dubai" target="_blank"><strong>One of Britain’s most wanted drug traffickers caught in Dubai</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>He was joined by 57-year-old Gerard Boyle, brothers Chris and John Sammon, ages 32 and 35, and 39-year-old Wayne Simmonds.</p>
<p>The gang believed the victims to be holding a substantial cash sum at their home in Greater Manchester and discussed logistics of the robbery at the office of Boyle – who was the registered director of a plastics recycling firm.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-of-british-drug-boss-robert-the-voice-dawes-he-was-prepar" target="_blank"><strong>Profile of British drug boss Robert “The Voice” Dawes</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Betts was heard to say: “His dad’s an old man and there’s only one kid in the house… You’ve got to give him a f****** slap …..you know what I mean? To tell you where the dough is.”</p>
<p>Wayne Simmonds agreed to carry out the robbery and discussed having a contact who specialized in impersonating police to gain entry to people’s homes.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“I’ll blowtorch your balls”</strong></span></p>
<p>Simmonds’ contact, who used the encrypted messaging service EncroChat and referred to himself as “the old Bill”, had bragged to Simmonds about the emergency blue lights he had fitted to vehicles and was later described by Simmonds during the trial as someone “not to be messed with”.</p>
<p>Further conversations between the men indicated they were willing to torture victims to acquire the money: “I’d just walk in and I’ll just bang him and just tie him up, and cut his ear off and then tell him…I’ve been down your area and cut people up….Believe me I’ll blowtorch your balls and cut your ear off…Put it this way I know an iron hurts in your chest,” Betts said.</p>
<p>Betts, Boyle, Simmons, and the Sammons also discussed drug supply and pricing, including the purchase and sale of around five kilograms of cocaine.</p>
<p>Further searches of both the Manchester business premises where their conversations were recorded and a property on Sandgate Road, Southampton, linked to Simmonds, led to the discovery of 100 grams of cocaine, drugs paraphernalia including a drugs press and 3 kilograms of Boric acid.</p>
<p>They were arrested on May 11, 2020, along with 35-year-old William Skillen, who was also involved in the drug conspiracy.</p>
<p>They will be sentenced at the same court on August 23.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>