Big mistakes that led
ABUNGLING drug dealer answered his phone to an undercover police officer and immediately told him: “I’ve got loads today, lad, meet me in Vicky Ave.”
The loose lips of Peter Ball helped police fit another piece of the jigsaw together to track down the wellknown High Parkers organised crime group, who caused misery around Sefton for years.
This week, 15 men were locked up for sentences that totalled 115 years for their 28 month drugs conspiracy, mainly based in Southport.
It was headed by ringleader Nathan Ball, and assisted by James Gelling, one of three infamous ASBO brothers and who once killed a Bulgarian dadof-two in 2019 as he made his way home watching Liverpool’s Champions League trophy win.
From 2018, detectives dealt with the gang on a regular basis as they constructed a prosecution which this week saw most of the gang jailed at Liverpool Crown Court.
On September 18, of that year, a police officer rang the last known telephone number of Peter Ball, and after it was engaged for ten minutes, finally got through.
Without prompting, Ball offered up: “I’ve got loads today, lad, meet me in Vicky Ave,” and then ended the call.
Other antics of the “High Parkers” emerged this week including drugs being stuffed inside a female delivery driver’s bra and parcels of cannabis coming in from California, but intercepted at Heathrow, labelled “Child’s Toy.”
They were destined for the
Sefton dealers.
On one occasion, last August, one now-jailed dealer
Kieran Bradshaw was found stripped to his underwear on Longmoor Lane in Aintree.
He was having a psychotic “episode” outside the William Hill bookies, caused by taking drugs, and wrongly believed he’d been burnt to the feet and legs with acid.
On November 6, 2018, dealer Jesse Fashoni was approached by police as he was wanted for an unrelated matter at the time, and discarded an item in the back of his car, parked on Duke Street, Southport.
He told officers: “I threw an ounce of weed in the back, it’s me own smoke,” but it revealed 26 grams of the Class B drug, valued at £390, and a search of his home uncovered £1,020 cash along with sealable bags, medical cannabis labels and scales.
More hits from the police continued during the conspiracy, and on May 11, 2019, a delivery driver was stopped and 20 knotted white plastic wraps of cocaine, valued at £1335, were seized, hidden in socks and secreted in the gear stick.
His mobile phone was constantly ringing and receiving texts while officers were dealing with him.
Police believed the violent attack on Ventsislav Marginov, 51, on July 2019, in Southport, which killed him, and led to a manslaughter conviction for 33-year-old James Gelling showed the gang’s willingness to use “indiscriminate violence.”
Gelling’s brother
Jordan, Kane
Doherty, and Ryan Edwards, all jailed for the drugs conspiracy, were also at the scene of the fatal attack on the migrant worker two years ago.
Nathan Ball, the ringleader for the dealing, was convicted of assault in connection with the tragedy.
Police believed that “the group also had a local reputation for violence enhancing the fear of those who became indebted to them”, made clear by an assault on fellow dealer Ryan Edwards after he tried to stop working for the “High Parkers.”
Cara Wilding, yet to be sentenced for her role in the gang, was a frequent delivery driver and was stopped on numerous occasions by police having also failed drug swipe tests.
On June 6, 2019, she tried to escape from police before one of the phones she had was found to be running the gang’s “cocaine line”, and two months later she was stopped again in a BMW on Roe Lane, Southport, when 23 knotted white plastic wraps of cocaine were recovered from inside her bra along with £375 in cash.
Three days later on August 19, 2019, Wilding was stopped again, in a BMW, in Ainsdale which tried to speed off before dealer Kane Doherty, the front seat passenger, got out and ran away.
Wilding was arrested for this, failed a drug drive swipe and was charged with dangerous driving.
On October 1, 2019, four men linked to the gang ran from a car that was being chased by other civilian vehicles on Liverpool Road, Southport, before it crashed into a wall.
Also in October, Wilding was stopped by police in a car on Prescot Road, Melling, where a wrap of cocaine and £1,100 was found.
WhatsApp messages between gang members freely talked of their drugs menu and what was on offer to addicts, and in one posting Fashoni boasted: “I’ve been doing it for ten years, lad.
“Same thing every day, trust me.” As the net closed around the gang, in February and March, last year, Border Force officials at Heathrow on three occasions intercepted drugs packages meant for Southport gang members.
Each contained cannabis valued at between £3,000-£4,000 and were labelled ‘child’s toy” to try and throw the authorities off the scent.
Also in March 2020, a short chase and police stop led to Daniel Compton, Doherty and Jordan Gelling being found burping and spitting, a sign they had just swallowed drugs just before being pulled over.
Six months later, last September, ringleader Nathan Ball was arrested following a domestic dispute with his partner when he threatened to burn her house down and that of her parents.
Ball ran the illegal trade, described as a “24/7 operation” which involved at the very least 5.25kg of cocaine, but which Judge Garrett Byrne reminded would have been far more.
Judge Byrne added: “The operation inflicted very substantial harm on the public.
“The harm caused by this is obvious, and the terrible toll of those addicted, and the wider adverse affect on the community.”
Speaking after the sentencing, Detective Inspector Catherine Walsh said: “This sentencing marks the end of an extensive investigation which has dismantled this extremely harmful OCG, and I’m sure the communities of Southport and beyond share our satisfaction that these people have been removed from the streets.
“They will be unable to spread their misery any longer. Drug supply and associated violent crime ruins the lives of countless people, and those sentenced have also thrown away their own futures by getting involved.
“Hopefully some of those jailed today will reflect upon the risks, the harm, and their punishments, and change their ways.
“Serious and organised crime remains a priority for Merseyside Police, and we will continue to take