Cross-county dealers who conspired to sell drugs worth £500,000 are jailed

Eight men involved in a cross-county conspiracy to transport and sell drugs with a street value of over £500,000 have been jailed.

Brett Anslow, 39, Richard Lawrence, 34, Alan Ballinger, 28, Shane Tyrell, 48, Michael Chand, 54, Jason Grindle, 36, Trevor Cook, 48, and Paul Johnson, 35, were each sentenced to between 3.5 and 9 years at Gloucester Crown Court today.

Dozens of meetings at pubs, businesses, home addresses and storage units across the West Midlands and Gloucestershire were arranged between the dealers, who conspired to transport and cut the cocaine further to ensure huge profits from any future sale.

The conspiracy to supply cocaine ran from February 2020 through to September 2021, some 19 months.

Together they formed two organised crime groups involved in a complex supply chain that saw the drugs moved from the West Midlands to the Forest of Dean and Monmouth area.

The West Midlands group was headed by Anslow, with Cook and Chand working under him. The Forest of Dean contingent was headed up by Lawrence, with Johnson, Tyrell and Grindle assisting him.

Lawrence and Anslow played leading roles in their respective groups, directing operations and co-ordinating the supply of the drugs.

Grindle was involved in the financial arm of the Forest of Dean group, paying rent for a storage unit where drugs, cash and other items of use were held. Tyrell owned a shop and garage where high purity cocaine was discovered, along with equipment used to alter drugs.

Chand had been associated with Anslow since at least 2015 and was involved in six meetings of the groups following the arrests of Tyrell and Lawrence. Cook was a trusted courier and involved in more than 20 meetings.

Johnson took part in 13 meetings and, when stopped by officers, was found with large quantities of drugs in his possession. Ballinger sent bulk messages advertising the sale of drugs and became more involved in the operation following the July arrests.

ANPR data and telecommunications were vital to uncovering the extent of their offending. Between February 2020 and September 2021 the groups exchanged hundreds of calls and text messages, where they shared addresses for the co-ordinated delivery of cash and drugs.

Direct observation of the key players involved in the transport of the cocaine led to arrests and subsequent searches, where more crucial evidence was uncovered that proved the frequency of their trips to and from the West Midlands.

On 23 April 2021, Anslow was driving a Vauxhall Vivaro van in Kingswinford when he was boxed in by police. He collided with a police car and fled the scene. The van was later recovered and police recovered a Nokia phone.

At around 7:30pm, an officer saw Johnson sat in his car in St Briavels Castle, Gloucestershire with a suspicious clingfilm-wrapped package in the back seat.

After the officer attempted to remove the car keys from the ignition, Johnson accelerated, lurching the car forward with the officer hanging onto the side of the vehicle by clinging onto the key.

Johnson was arrested and found with more than 22 grams of crack cocaine and almost 70g of cocaine hydrochloride.

On 6 July, 2021, arrest warrants were executed at Tyrell’s home and a butcher’s shop. In total, more than 3.4kg of cocaine and 1kg of Benzocaine were recovered along from his home address. Tyrell’s DNA and Cook’s fingerprints were also found on a separate blue tub which contained 2.7kg of cocaine.

Further searches of their properties, including a rented garage, found multiple kilograms of amphetamine, large quantities of cash, digital scales and drugs press.

A search at Lawrence’s home address uncovered a cash counting machine, cash totalling more than £5,000 and a crypto currency wallet. In his self-storage unit, police also found 1.3kg of cocaine, ecstasy tablets stamped ‘Fortnite’ after the popular computer game and chemicals used for the adulterating of drugs.

Both Lawrence and Tyrell were arrested but plans to continue their lucrative operations were already underway. Ballinger stepped in as head of the Forest of Dean group to replace Lawrence, who was using a secret mobile phone while in custody to communicate with his ‘mules’.

On September 15, warrants were executed at the addresses of Anslow, Cook, Chand and Grindle. In all, 1.4kg of cocaine, cash totalling £49,235, Boric acid, LSD, DMT and mobile phones were recovered.

Johnson was arrested on 4 December for his part in the conspiracy. Ballinger was arrested at his home address on 10 December, 2021. Officers found dozens of wraps of cocaine and over £44,000 in cash.

Christine Hart, Crown Advocate for CPS South West, said: “This was a sophisticated drugs ring that involved two groups of dealers operating a lucrative and large scale distribution network.

“They were organised, determined and driven solely by their own selfish interests. Despite police arrests meaning their numbers were rapidly thinning, the two groups ploughed ahead with their profitable plans to pump dangerous drugs into the Gloucestershire area.

“This was a highly complicated investigation, and I would like to thank all involved which saw the defendants convicted and sentenced today.

“Drug-related crime is corrosive – it damages not only those involved in buying and selling and their families, but the communities in which they live. The CPS is committed to working with the police to disrupt the supply of drugs by bringing those involved to justice and ensuring they do not profit from their criminality.”