Town man charged as police intercept car
A SOUTHPORT man was among two people charged after police dramatically intercepted a car on a main road into the town.
The arrests came when officers from Project Medusa, working alongside those from the Roads Policing Matrix Vehicle Enforcement Team (MVET), stopped the car on the A565 near Banks on Saturday afternoon.
The interception was part of a preplanned County Lines operation and saw officers descend on the vehicle on the busy road as it travelled back towards Southport.
A search of the car was carried out and a 29-year-old man and a 36-yearold woman were subsequently arrested.
On Monday morning, police confirmed that Christopher Jopson, of Brooke Close, Southport, Merseyside and Lucy McTaggart, of Tennyson
Avenue, Bryning with Warton, Lancashire, have been charged with being concerned in the supply of Class A drugs.
The pair went before Liverpool Magistrates Court that morning for an initial hearing and are next due at Liverpool Crown Court.
Detective Inspector Gary Stratton said: “Project Medusa works across force boundaries and with other teams within Merseyside Police to ensure we make arrests and take potential offenders off our streets.
“It works in partnership with the Force’s MVET team: a proactive policing team dedicated to denying criminals the use of our road network.
“County Lines drug dealing blights communities and the lives of those taking drugs and those who are often coerced into dealing them on behalf of organised crime groups.”