How drugs gang exploited ‘anxious, fearful’ teenager

BOY, 14, MADE DELIVERY TO UNDERCOVER

A court case about a heroin and crack dealer has heard how the drugs gang of which he was a member used a “fearful and anxious” 14-year-old boy to make deliveries to addicts.

Undercover police officers were investigating a drug network known as the Ash Line, where addicts would call a mobile number that would be answered by Abdul Rahman. The drugs would then be delivered by a runner for the gang.

Rahman, 22, pleaded guilty to being concerned in the supply of heroin and crack cocaine between June and September this year and last week appeared at Leicester Crown Court, where he received a lengthy jail sentence.

The court heard how the case involved an undercover officer who obtained the Ash Line phone number from a drug addict in the Hinckley area.

He called and asked for the drugs and they were delivered by the 14-year-old boy, who the court heard was “anxious, fearful and a little tearful”.

The officer discovered the boy was living in social care and had often been reported as missing, the court heard.

Once the investigators confirmed the phone line was being used to sell drugs, catching Rahman was very easy.

The court heard that not only had Rahman used the phone number to book several taxis – giving his name and address – but he had even given that number to the probation service after a previous drug offence.

After arresting Rahman, police found “mass-marketing messages” sent out to anything up to 125 people, advertising drugs.

About 200 texts and calls were received by the phone most days.

Simon Sheriff, representing Rahman,

of no fixed address, said that his client was only a phone operator and had no contact with any drugs or money.

He said his client had been arrested in the past while working as a runner for the Ash Line, which resulted in some of the organisation’s drugs being seized by the police.

After that, Rahman was sent a threatening photo of his sister putting her young daughter into her car with a reminder that he owed the organisation money. Having lost his job as a warehouseman earlier this year, Rahman had no choice but to work off his debts to the gang, Mr Sheriff said.

He said: “He was in affect a telephone operator. He would take calls. It was an efficient, separated system.”

Mr Sheriff added that Rahman’s mother had passed away last month while he was in custody and his own three-year-old daughter is being told he is on holiday because he does not want her to know he worked for drug dealers.

Judge Mark Watson jailed Rahman for 2,045 days – just under five years and eight months.

He said it would have been much longer if he believed Rahman had been involved in giving orders to the 14-year-old boy.

He told Rahman: “That would have been a significant aggravating factor.

“I read with real sadness that description – you were that young man in the past.”

The officer discovered the boy was living in social care and had often been reported as missing