Is going dead coffin? We fixed ‘em with false bottoms to ferry maybe eight kilos of smack’

RANCH: Prized Black Angus cattle later plead guilty to 200 misdemeanour violations of the Bank Secrecy Act.

At the height of his career, Lucas had over £40million in various Cayman Island banks and 1,000 kilograms of heroin on hand worth £200,000 a kilo.

To “hide” the exchanged money, Lucas bought into legitimate businesses – like a string of dry cleaners and petrol stations – in the hope of avoiding detection.

He owned office buildings in Detroit, apartments in Los Angeles, Miami and Puerto Rico, and a several thousand acre ranch called “Paradise Valley” in North Carolina where he had 300 head of Black Angus cattle and prize breeding bulls.

Lucas also made the rounds in New York’s celebrity circuit, where he would often be seen at the hottest nightclubs in Manhattan, hobnobbing with famous athletes like Joe Louis and Muhammad Ali and entertainers like James Brown and Diana Ross.

He spent money freely, once buying a couple of £100,000 Van Cleef bracelets for both him and his wife.

But just as Frank Lucas wouldn’t have been successful obtaining and transporting the heroin from Southeast Asia without the support of corrupt military personnel, so too would he have been unable to sell the stuff on the streets of Harlem without dishonest cops.

During the 1960s and 1970s, the NYPD’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU) was hopelessly corrupt.

The unit had developed a cowboy-like mentality, breaking in and conducting warrantless searches of suspected drug dealers, creating illegal phone taps, using bribery, and controlling addicted informants with confiscated heroin.

Several of the officers were on the take with local drug dealers to look the other way. At one point, Frank Lucas was caught by the head of the SIU, Bob Leuci, with several kilograms of heroin and cocaine in the boot of his car.

According to Lucas, he SILVER SCREEN: Denzel Washington potrayed Lucas (right) was taken to the police station, where he had to negotiate his release with an offer of £20,000 and two “keys” of heroin.

But in time, the police corruption made national news – and the Justice Department wanted it stopped.

On January 28, 1975, a strike-force staged a surprise raid on Frank Lucas’ house in the upscale neighbourhood of Teaneck, New Jersey.

In a panic, Lucas’ wife threw several suitcases stuffed with cash out the window.

In all, around £450,000 was recovered – what Lucas referred to as “street money”.

Also found were keys to several Cayman Island safe-deposit boxes, property deeds and a ticket to a United Nations ball, compliments of the ambassador of Honduras.

At the trial, several people testified about the devastating effects of heroin, particularly Lucas’ “Blue Magic” brand, which was far more potent than most heroin and caused many deaths due to overdose.

The prosecutor’s case against Lucas declared he had “killed more black people than the KKK with the sale of Blue Magic”.

The jury turned in a guilty verdict and Lucas was sentenced to 70 years in prison.

But after just a few months, Lucas turned informant and coughed up names of Mafia accomplices and corrupt members of the NYPD.

He even gave up Atkinson, his heroin connection in Thailand.

As a reward for his information, Lucas’ sentence was reduced to 15 years. He was released in 1981.

Then, in 2007, Hollywood once again paid Lucas a visit, with the biopic American Gangster, starring Denzel Washington, depicting his extraordinary life of crime.