Benefits couple ran cocaine ring to pay for their £40,000 wedding
A BENEFIT-claiming couple funded their lavish £40,000 wedding and a string of luxury holidays by running a cocaine ring.
Carl and Donna Honey-Jones dealt cocaine with their cousins and siblings in Swansea to pay for breaks in the Maldives and Lapland.
The pair drew attention to themselves by their extravagant spending, which could not have been supported by their low income and benefit allowance, Swansea Crown Court heard yesterday.
While living in the suburbs of city, the Honey- Joneses drove top-ofthe-range Audi and BMW cars with private number plates.
They travelled in a horse-drawn carriage to their flashy wedding at a 14th-century church.
The couple both pleaded guilty to money laundering. Carl also admitted conspiring to supply class A drugs.
Judge Paul Thomas yesterday jailed Carl Honey- Jones for nine years, saying he had led the drugs operation which saw large quantities of cocaine brought from Liverpool to Swansea.
‘Carl Honey- Jones, you were the dealer principal and in your case it financed an extravagant lifestyle of foreign holidays, a lavish wedding and luxury cars,’ the judge told him.
‘The sums involved were in the seven figures and you, Carl Honey-Jones, were at the very top of that conspiracy. Although it was lucrative, the operation that you led was inept and amateurish.
‘Top-of-the-range cars and luxury brands in [the couple’s street] were bound to attract suspicion.’
Honey- Jones, 31, involved his 58- Guilty: The Honey-Joneses year-old father-in-law Brian Harding, who mixed cocaine with cutting agents in his garage. He was described in court as his son-inlaw’s ‘right-hand man’, distribut- ing the drugs to street dealers and users around Swansea and collecting payments. Harding was jailed for five-and-a-half years.
The drugs network was taken apart after police raided 11 addresses last year. Cocaine with a
‘Extravagant lifestyle ’
potential street value of £750,000, and almost £60,000 in cash was seized along with expensive jewellery, including a Rolex watch, as well as cars and quad bikes.
Detectives also found a notebook detailing drug deals. The amounts were described in court as ‘eye- watering’. Officers found receipts for Honey- Joneses’ wedding totalling £40,000 and various family holidays to Mexico, Dubai, the Maldives and Florida, also costing around £40,000. A Christmas trip to Lapland had also been booked.
Carl Honey- Jones’s cousin Matthew Jones was stopped by police while driving an expensive Mercedes which had thousands of pounds in the boot. He was sentenced to eight years in prison.
The brother and sister of 32-yearold Donna Honey- Jones were caught after calling the police about threats they had received from gangsters. David Owens and Laura Harding were both given 16-month suspended sentences.
Donna Honey-Jones is due to be sentenced on July 6.