Cocaine courier jailed for 32 months

A drug courier who was caught with cocaine worth nearly £160,000 on the streets after a police surveillance operation was yesterday jailed for 32 months.

Liyapa Sikazwe was a passenger in a car that was intercepted by officers as it headed north of the A90 Dundee to Aberdeen road.

Police recovered a supermarket carrier bag from the vehicle containing almost two-and-a-quarter kilos of cocaine.

Two kilos of the Class A drug were heavily cut with the bulking agent benzocaine, but the smaller amount was 66% pure cocaine.

Sikazwe, 20, formerly of Logie Place, Aberdeen, earlier admitted being concerned in the supply of cocaine on January 29 this year on the road near Stonehaven and elsewhere.

Defence counsel Gareth Jones said Sikazwe realised what he had done was wrong and has expressed remorse.

The judge, Lord Kinclaven, accepted that he had received a positive social work report and had no criminal record.

But the judge said he had been acting as a courier of Class A drugs as a way of obtaining financial gain and that custody was appropriate.