Police break up drug trafficking gang and recover large stash of cocaine
A Chiswick man has been jailed for 16 years along with four others for trafficking over £50 million worth of cocaine.
Dejan Stankovic, (41) of Southfield Road, Chiswick, was described by police as the leader of the network and importer of the drugs.
He has been jailed for a total of 19-and-a-half years. He was sentenced to 16 years for conspiracy to supply cocaine and three-and-a half years for possessing criminal proceeds. The sentences are to run concurrently.
A senior police inspector described the cocaine stash as 99.9% pure, “the highest a UK laboratory has ever recorded”. If it had been cut with other agents, it would have equated to over half a tonne of cocaine on the streets, he said.
The police also found a haul of £28,000 and a large sum of euros in the Chiswick home of Stankovic.
Five men were jailed for a total of 47-and-a-half years for trafficking over £50 million worth of cocaine into the capital, following a surveillance operation by the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS).
Douglas Batley,(50) of Hawley Road, Rustington, Sussex, was jailed for 11 years for conspiracy to supply cocaine. David Moore, (45) of Sunny Close, Worthing, Sussex, was jailed for nine years for conspiracy to supply cocaine. Nicholas Blackburn, (44) Lawler Street, Bootle, Liverpool, was jailed for six years for conspiracy to supply cocaine. Daniel Persson-Negucic, (33), of Mill Lane, Kilburn, London, was jailed for two years for possessing criminal proceeds.
They pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing and were sentenced at Woolwich Crown Court on June 1st.
Officers from the Central Task Force, (part of Specialist Crime and Operations within the MPS) carried out an investigation into an organized criminal network involved in the supply of class A drugs.
The leader of the network and importer of the drugs, Dejan Stankovic, had control of a safe house at St Pauls Close, Rochester, Kent where the drugs were housed. Stankovic was in contact with Douglas Batley, the distributor of the drugs, who was facilitating the onward supply of at least 17 kilos of the cocaine.
Batley had arranged for courier, David Moore to collect three holdalls containing 17 kilos of cocaine and distribute them. Moore supplied one of the holdalls containing 5kg cocaine to fellow courier, Nicholas Blackburn who had travelled to Kent from Liverpool.
On 28 November 2011, officers arrested Stankovic and Moore in the car park of the 'Three Crutches Public House', Old Watling Street, Rochester, in possession of a holdall containing 7kg cocaine. Moore was found in possession of £1,400.
On the same day Blackburn was arrested in Green Street Road, Dartford, Kent, in possession of the holdall containing 5kg cocaine. He was also found in possession of £2,783 cash.
A further £28,200 cash and 21,150 Euros were recovered at Stankovic's home address in Chiswick.
116 kilos of cocaine were found at the safe house making a total of 128 kilos seized with a street value in excess of £50 million.
On 29 November 2011, Stankovic, Moore and Blackburn were all charged with conspiracy to supply cocaine. On 30 November 2011, the man responsible for looking after the safehouse, Persson-Negucic, was arrested at his home address in Kilburn. A suitcase containing £500,340 belonging to Stankovic was recovered at his address. Persson-Negucic was charged later that day with conspiracy to supply cocaine and money laundering.
On 2 February, Batley was arrested at his home address in Little Hampton, Sussex. He was charged with conspiracy to supply cocaine on the same day. The cash was successfully forfeited.
Detective Inspector Colin Stephenson of the Central Task Force said: "The majority of the cocaine seized registered 99.9% pure, the highest a UK laboratory has ever recorded. If it had been cut with other agents, it would have equated to over half a tonne of cocaine on the streets.
"Many of the shootings and stabbings carried out in London are as a result of turf wars over the supply of drugs, the MPS Central Task Force has prevented a significantly large amount of drugs reaching those gangs and flooding our communities.
"The jail term imposed on this organised criminal network reinforces the message that the MPS will continue to combat and disrupt those intent on trafficking drugs into the UK."
June 14, 2012