Brothers plotted to supply gangs with £20m of cocaine
TWO brothers who attempted to deliver £20m of cocaine to organised crime groups in the north west have been jailed.
Alan, 51, and John Tobin, 40, were running a ‘smooth’ and ‘successfully profitable’ criminal organisation, which saw them supply well-known gangs in the north west and other parts of the UK with drugs.
The brothers were said to be supplying ‘huge amounts’ of cocaine to organised crime bosses, Anthony Cullen, 33, and 30-year-old Jamie Oldroyd – who both headed a heavily armed drug gang in Warrington.
Their criminal enterprise was backed up by former UFC competitor Robbie ‘The Bear’ Broughton, who enforced debts and collected payments from notorious gang leaders.
Liverpool Crown Court heard that the 6ft 2in, 18st heavyweight moved an estimated £30m of cash and used an encrypted EncroChat phone with the handle ‘NovaBear.’
The Tobins had men trading primarily in cocaine, but also in heroin, cannabis and ketamine – delivering to other gangs in Manchester, West Yorkshire, Cumbria, Humberside, North Wales, Cornwall, London and Scotland.
The pair had instructed a drug dealer named Jamie Simpson, 33, to deliver £20m of cocaine from Kent to Warrington – without the knowledge that Simpson was under surveillance.
Detectives from Cheshire Police’s Serious and Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) seized the drugs on the M6 on August 2, 2018 during a surveillance operation on Simpson.
The 186kg of cocaine discovered under the floorboards of a van in a
specially adapted ‘hide’ was the largest ever seizure of cocaine on land in the UK.
John Tobin’s DNA was found on the bubble wrap of one of the drug blocks – which the court heard was crucial to connecting him to the drugs conspiracy.
The brothers were sentenced at Liverpool Crown Court alongside their associates Broughton, Brian McQuillan and Simon Leech.
Alan Tobin was sentenced to 20 years and his brother John received a 19 years and eight-month sentence.
Broughton was jailed for eight years and six months, McQuillan six years and four months and Leech eight years.
While the brothers were in command of the criminal enterprise, they enlisted the help of Broughton, Leech and McQuillan to look after the day-to-day running of their business.
They recruited 29-year-old Leech to act as a conduit, to minimise any
direct contact made to themselves.
Broughton’s role was to collect cash from the organised crime leaders who had been supplied drugs by the Tobins.
The 38-year-old former UFC fighter also enforced debts and made threats on their behalf, the court heard.
McQuillan, 51, was responsible for couriering large amounts of crash across the UK.
The court heard how the brothers were ultimately running a ‘smooth’ and ‘successfully profitable’ criminal organisation until detectives began three operations into their customers from 2016 to 2018.
This involved targeting Lee Stoba, 47, Cullen and Oldroyd – codenamed Operation Bullfight, Operation Samurai and Operation Dreadnought respectively.
During the operation, detectives witnessed John Tobin meeting with Cullen, along with his accomplice Broughton and a man named Robbert Bibby at a countryside cafe,
where they discussed the supply of drugs.
Alan Tobin was also observed meeting with Jamie Oldroyd and Jamie Simpson at a cafe in Warrington to talk about the onward supply of class A drugs to organised crime gangs in Carlisle, Liverpool, Scunthorpe and Sussex.
The operations led to large amounts of drugs and money being seized by police and resulted in debts owed to the Tobin brothers that were too big for the day-to-day employees to deal with.
As the net closed in on the Tobins, the brothers had to become more hands on.
On one occasion, Alan was meeting with Cullen at a pub car park in Warrington, where a heated argument was seen to take place between them.
Their criminality drew to a close on Wednesday, September 9, last year after detectives executed a number of warrants in Widnes, Warrington and St Helens.