THE BIGGEST GANGLAND BUST EVER
»»Scots snared in huge »»Cops crack gangsters’ »»Cash, drugs, guns international crime sting encrypted phone network and explosives seized
SCOTS crooks have been hit in a huge international police operation.
Mr Bigs are being rounded up in Operation Venetic, which saw cops crack their encrypted phone network.
SCOTTISH crime gangs have been rocked in one of the biggest international stings in history.
Gangsters including several well known Mr Bigs are being rounded up in Operation Venetic, which cracked a phone encryption network they thought made them untouchable.
The joint crackdown by European police forces, aided by the National Crime Agency, has led to Police Scotland serving more than 50 warrants already.
More than £25million in drugs and £7million in cash and firearms, ammunition and explosives have also been also seized, with major input from Scotland’s Serious Organised Crime Taskforce.
Major criminal cases are expected to be called at the High Court in coming months and years after the goldmine of evidence was accessed.
Big-time crooks believed the EncroChat system meant they could speak freely about major plots with no danger of being brought to justice.
But after the code was cracked in March, they were effectively relaying their crime plans to a hotline monitored by specialist crime squads.
Millions of messages have been analysed, acted on and many are still being processed.
Among the intelligence-led seizures so far for the Scottish force, who have already made 59 arrests, are:
● 28million street Valium pills
● 200kg of cocaine
● £5,447,000 and €1,352,000 in cash seized
● 8 firearms
● 33.9kg of heroin
● 64kg of cannabis cultivations
● 330,000 prescription pills
After police were able to crack the networks, they harvested inside information on drug deals and murder plots. Gerry McLean, NCA head of investigations for Scotland, said: “This piece of activity in Scotland and across the UK was unprecedented in scale.
“It is, without doubt, the broadest and deepest ever operation into serious organised crime, with the people targeted at the top end of the criminal tree.
“We are talking about the kind of high-profile criminals that people are reading about in the Daily Record, day in, day out.
“It is usual with our intelligence that members of the public play a big part. The beauty of this unprecedented operation is that it was the criminals who have brought the cases against themselves. There will be many criminals looking over their shoulders.”
McLean said the intelligence gathered enabled Scots police to intercept large movements of drugs, cash and firearms at the high end of the deals, instead of targeting lower level crooks.
He said: “This has given us a fantastic insight into the inner workings of organised crime.
“What has been announced today marks a fantastic piece of international cooperation, in which the UK really came together as a law enforcement community. We have intercepted more than 200 threats of violence, including threats to life, which have enabled us to take firearms off the streets, as well as cash and drugs.”
McLean said the high cost of the EncroChat system meant it was only serious crooks that were caught in the trap.
He said: “This platform also created closed networks of contacts, where trusted new contacts had to be introduced.”
France-based EncroChat charged £1500 for a device on a six-month contract. It was forced to send out a warning to users in early June to say that its servers had been hacked by a government entity.
This left investigators with a
race against time to make the most of the wealth of information available, targeting “Mr and Mrs Bigs” before they could cover their tracks.
NCA director of investigations Nikki Holland said the breach was like “having an inside person in every top organised crime group in the country”.
Law enforcement have been aware of EncroChat for years.
Drug dealers Andrew Venna and Matthew Cornwall, who operated in Gloucester and Stroud, used the devices before they were jailed in May 2019 – as did Mark Fellows and Steven Boyle, who were jailed for life last year for the 2015 gangland killings of John Kinsella and Paul Massey in Liverpool. Police Scotland Assistant Chief Constable Angela McLaren said: “These intelligence-led proactive operations, which have been undertaken in partnership with the National Crime Agency and the UK’s Border Force, have resulted in some of the largest seizures made by the service.
“Keeping our communities safe and continuing to make the country a hostile environment for those who seek to cause misery through organised criminality remains a priority.
“This underlines our commitment to the country’s Serious Organised Crime Strategy through the Taskforce and our collective determination to target those involved in these nefarious activities and strike at the very centre of their illicit operations.”
UK-wide, officers have so far arrested 746 suspects and seized more than £54million in cash and two tons of drugs, as well as 55 sports cars, 73 luxury watches and even a barge.
Since 2016, the National Crime Agency has been working with international law enforcement agencies to target EncroChat and other encrypted criminal communication platforms by sharing technical expertise and intelligence.
Two months ago, this collaboration resulted in partners in France and the Netherlands infiltrating the platform. The data harvested was shared via Europol.
Jennifer Harrower, procurator fiscal for specialist casework, said prosecutors who are experts in preparing gangland cases would be deployed to implement a raft of legislation created in Scotland specifically to target serious and organised criminals.
She added: “Beyond this, we will seek Serious Crime Prevention Orders to provide security for communities when those prosecuted are released from prison, and pursue them for their proceeds of crime to be restored to the communities where they belong.”
Scottish Justice Secretary Humza Yousaf, chair of Scotland’s Serious Organised Crime Taskforce, said: “Once again, the professionalism of Scotland’s police officers and support staff is evident in disrupting criminal activities and reducing the harm and misery inflicted on our communities.”
Lord Advocate James Wolffe QC said: “The operation also demonstrates the substantial benefits which we derive from international co-operation – benefits which help to ensure the safety and security of people living in Scotland.
“The Crown will continue to work with its partners across the justice sector to disrupt serious and organised crime.”