Gangster ran mobile phone racket from his Strangeways jail cell
AN ex-member of a notorious crime gang plotted to smuggle tiny mobile phones into Strangeways from WITHIN prison walls.
Wesley Brown was a member of the Liverpool-based Croxteth Crew.
Using his reputation, he tried to become the go-to guy for mobile phones while serving a sentence for firearms offences at HMP Manchester.
But Brown’s plan to trade sim cards and tiny phones capable of beating metal detectors was smashed when police and prison officers intercepted ‘mules’ smuggling them in.
Mini mobile phones seized during the police investigation cost £20 each. In prison, they can change hands for £350 to £500 because of their size.
Brown has now been jailed for 12 months after pleading guilty to conspiracy to convey prohibited articles into HMP Manchester.
He was jailed indefinitely for public protection and ordered to serve a minimum of three years and 50 weeks after being found guilty of possession of a firearm without a certificate and possessing a firearm with intent in 2006.
In 2004, he found guilty of possessing a prohibited weapon – a selfloading rifle – and possessing a firearm when prohibited. He survived being blasted with a shotgun in 2003 in a drive-by shooting.
Manchester Crown Court was told Brown and his partner Karen Duffy set others up to smuggle the phones into the prison.
The plot unravelled when two of their smugglers were caught.
On March 13 last year, Paul Maddocks visited Strangeways and met prisoner Simon Gibb. Prison officers saw them pass something between them.
Two small mobile phones and charging cables, tightly wrapped in cling film, were found in Gibb’s trousers. Another wrapped in cling film was found in Maddocks’ trousers.
Maddocks was arrested and admitted passing the phones to Gibb. It was suspected that Brown had pressured Gibb and Duffy had exploited Maddocks to smuggle the phones.
Four days later, Duffy parked her BMW in a side street near Strangeways. It was surrounded by police who had her under surveillance. She was found with six ‘micro-sized’ mobiles, sim cards, cling film and lubricant.
It is suspected that Duffy was waiting to meet Louisa Carberry and Jason Stoddart to hand the phones over for them to smuggle in during a visit. Brown, Duffy, Carberry and Stoddart all chose to make ‘no comment’ when grilled by detectives.
A phone, suspected of being lobbed out of a window by Brown, revealed contact with Duffy and Stoddart.
Stoddart, 38, of Malwood Street, Liverpool; Carberry, 38, of Malwood Street, Liverpool; Maddocks, 48, of Croxteth Hall Lane, Liverpool; and Gibb, 34, of HMP Manchester, originally from Yorkshire, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to convey prohibited articles into HMP Manchester, namely mobile phones.
Maddocks and Gibb were sentenced to 12 months on February 16.
Brown was sentenced to 12 months after pleading guilty to conspiracy to convey prohibited articles into prison.
Duffy, 40, of Serinhall Drive, Liverpool, was sentenced to 12 months after pleading guilty to conspiracy to convey prohibited articles into HMP Manchester. She received concurrent sentences for possession of a class B drug with intent to supply of 10 months, and one month for possession of cocaine.
Stoddart and Carberry will be sentenced at a later date.
Sentencing, Judge Martin Rudland said: “Wesley Brown orchestrated this attempt to get these items into prison where they have considerable value. It is rife and it is serious.”