Drugs gang jailed for smuggling
A gang of men behind a plot to import up to £10m worth of heroin from Pakistan to the Black Country inside industrial equipment has been jailed.
The group of eight men, who were caught after border officials discovered the drugs, were sent down for a total of 139 years and four months at Birmingham Crown.
Ameran Zeb Khan, 38, of Cobham Road, Bordesley Green, Mohammed Ali, 36, of Wyndcliff Road, Bordesley Green, and Sajid Hussain, 32, of Fieldhouse Road, Yardley, were sentenced to 22 years each.
Hussain was sentenced to another 9 months for another offence.
The men organised two container shipments from Lahore to the London Gateway Port in February and July 2014.
The second shipment was intercepted by Border Force officers who cut open the container’s cargo of industrial lathes to find 165kg of heroin.
Officers removed the drugs and reassembled the laths and sent them on to their delivery destination at an industrial unit off Dudley Road East in Oldbury.
They were met by Omar Isa, 36, Chipperfield Road, Castle Bromwich, and Imran Arif, 35, of Kenelm Road, Small Heath.
Isa was today sentenced to 15 years and six months in jail, while Arif was imprisoned for 10 years.
Mohammed Ashaf Khan, 49, of The Leverretts, Handsworth, who handled logistics for the conspiracy, was imprisoned for 17 and a half years while Rajesh Patel, 52, of Botley Road, Chesham, Buckinghamshire, who used his business to provide paperwork for the shipments, was jailed for 15 and a half years.
Zulfgar Munsaf, 38, Bellefield Road, Winson Green, who passed on the bosses’ instructions to the ground troops and was the only one of the group to plead guilty to avoid a trial, was given 14 years.
The heroin seized by Border Force, which the group planned to sell on in bulk, had a purity of 58 per cent and was worth £5m uncut.
Munsaf pleaded guilty to conspiracy to import heroin, while the remaining seven were found guilty of the same charge after a trial at Birmingham Crown Court.
Paul Risby, branch commander at the NCA, said: “This was a determined and capable criminal group. They had connections to heroin suppliers and used legitimate business paperwork to provide cover for their activity.
“This investigation put some really concerning members of the West Midlands criminal community in prison and the people of Birmingham and the West Midlands are safer as a result.
“The Border Force search in July 2014 also prevented a really significant shipment of heroin being sold on our streets and bringing with it all the misery that follows.
“Strong partnerships between the NCA, Border Force, West Midlands police and the CPS were vital in bringing about this result.”
