MUSIC FEST DRUG HAUL PALS JAILED
Young dads hid illegal stash in cider cans
Two best friends who smuggled £13,000 worth of ketamine and ecstasy into a music festival have been jailed.
andrew Rankin and James Jones, both 25 and fathers of young children, were arrested on the first day of the Creamfields festival in Cheshire after hiding their haul inside a crate of Strongbow fruit cider. a police sniffer dog led officers to five empty cans in the crate which were found to be stuffed with 514 tablets of MDMA (ecstasy) worth £5140 and 197 wraps of ketamine, valued at more than £8000.
Rankin and Jones, both of Dundee, were arrested on august 25, 2022. it was the same day Lucy george, 25, of neath, south Wales, died after taking half an ecstasy tablet, along with vodka and nitrous oxide at Creamfields.
police arrested 125 people during the four-day event at Daresbury and seized almost £90,000 worth of drugs.
When quizzed about their own drugs haul, Rankin, who lives in the East Marketgait area of Dundee, said that he was paying off a drug debt, while Jones of nearby Stobswell said he was in a “dark place” after his father’s death.
at Chester Crown, both men were jailed for three years after they admitted two charges of possessing class a and class B drugs with intent to supply.
Judge patrick Thompson said: “You both knew the risks you were taking.
“You knew outside the festival there is sign after sign warning people not to take drugs in.
“There were sniffer dogs and security and signs warning people of the sort of sentence you can get.
“i am afraid that you ignored those warnings and decided to take the risk.”