PRISON FOR STREET DEALER, 24, FOUND WITH £10K OF COCAINE

Ghulam since worked with youth groups

AN ‘arrogant’ drug dealer involved in a large scale supply has been jailed for nearly three years.

Israr Ghulam pleaded guilty to conspiring to supply crack cocaine and diamorphine as well as being concerned with class A drugs.

The 24-year-old, of Parkhouse Street, Shelton, below, was arrested in 2019 after being found in possession of £910 and a mobile phone.

On January 12 the previous year, a raid at a property on Rectory Road, Hanley, found £10,000-worth of cocaine and a ‘small quantity’ of diamorphine.

Messages were found on Ghulam’s phone from November 2018 which implicated him in street dealing of class A drugs, Stoke-on-trent Crown Court heard.

Jonathan Barker, prosecuting, said: “He was arrested at Havelock Place and found in possession of £910 with a mobile phone.

“Messages implicate him in street dealing...screenshots show him boasting about bearing wraps.

“The user is involved in large scale supply of drugs. The evidence shows he was a street dealer of class A drugs and doing it for financial advantage.”

Paul Cliff, mitigating, said: “Mr Ghulam has been actively engaged in working with youth groups for a year involving fundraising: going to disadvantaged parts of the city and encouraging the use of a knife bin.

“A young man that recognises the negative impact the supply of drugs will have on people.

“In 2018 he developed a deeply unpleasant addiction to the use of cocaine.

“He knows drugs have an adverse effect on those in his community. He is seeking to atone for when he was a younger man.

“He has stopped using drugs. “He himself describes himself as young and selfish at that time. He was a young man who was impressed by offenders, he had his head turned.

“He used drugs to fit in with some of those offenders. He was a boastful, immature and selfish individual. He tells me he is not the same person today.

“He continues to have good relationships with family members.

“They were shocked to discover his involvement, they are not a family that would condone his behaviour.

“He keeps away from what he describes as the ‘party scene’.”

Sentencing Ghulam to 35 months’ custody, Judge Graham Smith said: “The offending is serious – it developed into street dealing.

“Your attitude was described as arrogant. You now know about the harm drugs do to the lives of others.

“You found yourself under pressure to repay the debt. It’s down to the involvement of your family now that you are free from drugs.”