DRUGS IN CABS
BRISTOL COCAINE GANG JAILED AFTER POLICE STOP CABBIE WITH COCAINE WORTH £600,000
A cabbie was caught on the M4 transporting a cocaine haul worth up to £600,000. The Bristol Post reports that police pulled over Faysal Hussein-Abdalla after following him from Bristol to Newport on March 18, where he picked up the drugs before heading back to the West Country. The 32-year-old, of no fixed abode, was one of four men who have now been jailed for the supply of cocaine between Bristol and South Wales. They have been sentenced to a com- bined total of more than 25 years in prison following an Avon and Somerset Police investigation where officers seized six kilograms of the class A drug. The force estimated its street value to
be between £250K and £600K. David Griffiths, 50, and Hamse Moha- mod, 37, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to supply cocaine. Ilyas Osoble, 39, and 32-year-old Faysal Hussein-Abdalla were found guilty of the same offence following a trial. Police officers observed Mohamod and Osoble engaging with cabbie Hussein- Abdalla in Easton on March 18. They followed him to Newport where he met with Griffiths, handed him half a dozen bags each filled with one kilogram of cocaine. Hussein-Abdalla was stopped by police
on the M4 upon returning to the West Country and was arrested. The police investigation uncovered text messages and phone calls made by Osoble and Mohamod following the arrest, as they became increasingly concerned about why Hussein-Abdalla was delayed in dropping off the drugs. All four men involved were sentenced at Bristol Crown Court. Mohamod and Osoble were jailed on October 29, with the others in court on December 10. Griffiths received a prison sentence of five years and 10 months. Mohamod was jailed for six years and nine months. Hussein-Abdalla received a four-and-a- half-year sentence and Osoble was handed an eight-year jail term.
TWO DERBY CABBIES WERE PART OF HUGE £165 MILLION DRUGS RING
A dozen Derby criminals were part of a huge drugs gang that flooded the country with tens of millions of pounds of high purity cocaine. According to the Derby Telegraph, prosecutors at Derby Crown Court said a “conservative estimate” was that an astonishing 100kg of the highly- addictive powder moved through the members in just under a year the conspiracy ran. Some of the group carried out their nefarious affairs through encrypted phones in the hope their illegal activities would not be detected. And at least two of the gang went to Dubai where they mixed with those even further up the chain. Gareth Weetman, prosecuting, said: “This case involves the industrial and wholesale supply of cocaine across the country and the movement of millions of pounds of criminal funds every week.
JANUARY 2022
Mr Weetman continued: “Between March 16 and April 30, messages recovered from an encrochat phone revealed that £18,634,650 had been moved by the group, making an average of £405,101 per day. “In the 408 days the conspiracy ran for, that equates to £165m.” Mr Weetman said on June 16, last year, police raided the home of one of the conspirators and a search found £530,000 in bank notes. He said at the top of the gang were Jaswant Kajla and Manraj Johal who sold in large quantities to other dealers, including some in Derby. On the first day of what is expected to be a sentencing hearing that will not conclude until later this month due to the sheer number of defendants, Mr Weetman began outlining what specific roles those involved in the conspiracy played. He said Basharat Iqbal, a 46-year-old
cabbie from Normanton, ferried multiple kilograms of cocaine and hun- dreds of thousands of pounds in cash between London, Luton and Derby. Mr Weetman said: “On April 20, 2020, he was observed taking a money- moving trip to Stanmore. “He was found to be in possession of 4kg of cocaine and a further 3kg of cocaine in a wardrobe at his address. “We say his minimum involvement was 10kg in terms of supply and that’s a conservative estimate.” The prosecutor said Iqbal’s brother Banaras Iqbal, aged 42 also a cabbie from Normanton and father-of-four, was paid to transport hundreds of thousands of pounds in dirty money between gang members on 12 different occasions. The charges each of the group are being sentenced for are either conspira- cy to supply cocaine, conspiracy to supply heroin and/or money laundering.
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