Six drug
traffickers who used legitimate business service centres as a
front for their illegal trade have been sentenced to 102 years in
prison. Judge David Aubrey QC estimated the street value of the
drugs they trafficked at £117m.
The group is believed to have been the UK distribution arm of an
international network which attempted to import around 22 tonnes
of Class A and B drugs to the UK between February 2007 and April
2009. They used a number of tactics to keep their activity hidden, including:
* Adopting multiple company identities, including the fraudulent
use of real company names and logos
* Contracting business
service centres to act as messaging and collection points,
unwittingly receiving and forwarding packages of cocaine and
cannabis on their behalf
* Employing legitimate courier
companies to carry out collections and deliveries
* Spreading
their activity across a number of different locations
* Using
pseudonyms, pay as you go mobiles, and cash payments
The existence of the gang came to light in November 2008 after
staff at a business service centre in Cheltenham grew suspicious
of a number of packages which had been delivered to them and
called Gloucestershire Police. Officers discovered 40 kilos of
cocaine and contacted SOCA which launched an investigation.
Links were soon identified between several police drug seizures
in the UK and abroad which till then had been investigated
separately. Arrests were carried out nation-wide on 16 March 2010
with assistance from Greater Manchester, Surrey, Hampshire and
Cleveland Police forces.
Three of the gang - Paul Hewett, Karla Reeves, and Wayne Reed -
had their sentences reduced by a third because of early guilty
pleas but even so received sentences of 20 years, 16 years and
131/2 years respectively. Glen Cornick had his sentence reduced by
a fifth for pleading guilty at a later date and was sentenced to
91/2 years. Michael Pollard and Trevor Holland, both of whom went
to trial, were sentenced to 23 years and 20 years. Ian Hockerday
was sentenced to 12 months for money laundering.
As part of its work with specific business sectors, SOCA has
issued alerts to companies providing business facilities and to
courier companies, warning them of the signs that their services
are being exploited by criminal groups.
Photographs of the case can be downloaded at
www.soca.gov.uk/news/images-and-audio
Notes for Editors
1. Defendants' details:
* Trevor Holland of Horwich, Bolton, 22/04/78. Arrested 16 March
2010 in Bolton. Sentenced to 20 years.
* Michael Pollard of
Walkden, Manchester, 29/09/63. Arrested 16 March 2010 in
Manchester. Sentenced to 23 years.
* Paul Hewett of Lower
Froyle, Hampshire,18/07/57. Arrested 16 March 2010 in Hampshire,
pleaded guilty on 26 August. Sentenced to 20 years.
* Karla
Reeves of Grimsby, Humberside, 27/12/83. Arrested 16 March 2010 in
Grimsby, pleaded guilty on 26 August. Sentenced to 16 years.
*
Wayne Reed of Hartlepool, 24/02/85. Arrested 16 March 2010 in
Hartlepool, pleaded guilty on 26 August. Sentenced to 131/2
years.
* Glen Cornick of Javea, nr Alicante, Spain, 14/09/72.
Arrested 29 July 2010 on a European Arrest Warrant in Javea,
Spain, and returned to UK on 11 August 2010. Pleaded guilty on 4
October. Sentenced to 91/2 years.
* Ian Hockerday of Ash
Vale, Surrey, 14/12/57. Arrested 16 March 2010 in Surrey, pleaded
guilty to money laundering on 5 October. Sentenced to 12 months.
2. Background on drug seizures and arrests:
Catalunya, Spain, 4 July 2008 On 4 July 2008,
the Spanish Guardia Civil in Catalunya seized 486kgs of cannabis
concealed in 27 boxes said to contain books and publicity items.
The boxes were due to be transported by courier to a company in
Fountain Street, Manchester.
San Sebastian, Spain, 17 July 2008 On 17 July
2008, the Spanish Guardia Civil in San Sebastian searched a
consignment of 70 boxes said to contain promotional brochures
relating to a development on the Costa Blanca. The boxes contained
1,050kgs of cannabis and were addressed to a company called Solid
Foundation at premises in Bolton and Manchester.
Wrenthorpe, West Yorkshire, 17 October 2008
On Friday 17 October 2008, a Cheshire Constabulary covert
operation led officers to a lock up facility at Wrenthorpe and the
premises were searched under a warrant obtained by West Yorkshire
Police. The lock up had a hidden room from which officers
recovered around 180 boxes of cannabis resin, with an average
weight in excess of 20 kilos, and around 40 large boxes of skunk
cannabis each weighing between 4 and 11 kilos. The total weights
and values of the drugs recovered from the unit were:
* 2,996 kilos cannabis resin with a value in excess of £12.9
million
* 266 kilos herbal cannabis with a value in excess of
£1.1 million
* 89 kilos skunk cannabis with a value in excess
of £750,000
* 1 kilo amphetamine with a value of around £10,000
Delivery labels recovered at the lock up showed an address rented
by Trevor Holland of Horwich, Bolton.
Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, November 2008 On
Thursday 27 November 2008, Gloucestershire Police were contacted
by a business service centre in Cheltenham.
Staff were suspicious of a consignment of packages delivered for
a company which had rented space there since October 2007.
Gloucester Police examined the packages and found 40 kilos of
cocaine. They replaced the drugs with a dummy load in order to
undertake a controlled delivery. At midday on 28 November, a van
driven by Wayne Reed arrived to collect the consignment. He was
arrested after delivering the drugs to a contact in Liverpool.
Enquiries led to a search of an address in Cleethorpes at which
the company's e-mails were registered. Karla Reeves was
arrested there. Her laptop yielded details of eleven companies,
virtual offices in the UK, pseudonyms used, legitimate courier
companies, payments made, delivery labels and the frequency of
consignments. This evidence led to Paul Hewett, whose own laptop
yielded information common to other strands of the investigation
and links to the seizure in San Sebastian. Hewett had a number of
mobile phones which revealed a pattern of calls and text messages
relating to an importation in December 2007 and linking him to
Karla Reeves and Michael Pollard.
Bolton Manchester April 2009 On the evening
of 14 April 2009, SOCA enquiries identified a consignment of three
boxes at a parcel distribution centre, addressed to Horizon Tech
Services, Bolton. The boxes purported to contain technical graphic
data manuals but contained approximately 15 kilos of cocaine.
SOCA replaced the cocaine with a dummy load and with the
assistance of Greater Manchester Police carried out a controlled
delivery at around 08.30 the next morning. Trevor Holland was
arrested at the delivery address for being concerned in the supply
of Class A controlled drugs.
A search recovered various documents with links to the seizure in
San Sebastian and the seizure in Wrenthorpe. Three boxes identical
to those in the controlled delivery were also discovered though
these contained sand. Material from Karla Reeves' laptop
refers to 'dummy runs'. Forensic analysis of the
drugs packaging revealed similarities with the seizure at Cheltenham.
Contacts:
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