Reliant Robin life of drug smugglers

They lived in council houses, owned ice cream vans and drove Reliant Robins. Members of the West Midlands gang sentenced to more than 21 years for drug trafficking were not your average gangsters.

Wolverhampton Crown Court heard how four of the five cannabis smugglers made nothing from the multi-million pound trade.

But ringleader Michael Hartshorne was certainly benefiting from the dirty money. Despite living in a council house and his payslip saying he only made £250 a week, the 43-year-old drove a BMW X5 with a personalised number plate, gambled £280,000 in 18 months and spent £30,000 on jewellery. Judge Nicholas Webb sentenced Hartshorne, of Cemetery Road, Lye, to 11 years in prison for his role in the two-year conspiracy.

Judge Webb told him: "You are very much the most involved of those in the dock. You were part of a sophisticated and international organisation concerned with the importation of very considerable amounts of cannabis.

"You were not at the very top of that organisation, the evidence does not show that, but you were near the top. You arranged for the drugs to come into the warehouse and where they went, you had considerable control over the operation. You gave the orders and were in contact with the Dutch suppliers."

Judge Webb said Hartshorne, who ran pubs and owned ice cream and burger vans, was also involved in importing other goods including pornography, tablets and cigarettes.

He said the actual amount of cannabis brought in would never be known but Hartshorne was involved with the smuggling of at least 500kg.

The Serious and Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) originally estimated there were more than 30 tonnes of the drug brought into the country on lorries from Holland between February 2004 and March 2006.

Defending Hartshorne, Mr Michael Holland QC maintained he was a family man who had done charity work in the past.

He said: "There was not the cash lifestyle one would expect from a very high dealer, we are not talking about the characteristics of high living such as yachts and property. He is not a drugs baron, he is more a wheeler dealer who strayed from ice cream, into cigarettes, into cannabis."

Mr Richard Atkins, defending 52-year-old Alastair MacKenzie-Crow, of Brook Lane, Cradley Heath, said his client made pittance from the scheme. He said: "There were no Rolexes or cars, he drove a Reliant Robin and a pick-up truck, there was simply no money. He was the driver, there are those that are much higher up the chain. He gained nothing from this.

"Prison is a shock to him and will continue to be a shock to him at the age of 52."

However, Judge Webb said MacKenzie-Crow was determined to move higher up the chain of command. He said: "He was getting greedy and determined to get ahead. He was really up for it and looking for a warehouse. He cannot be considered totally subservient."

MacKenzie-Crow's girlfriend Sarah Chater, aged 41 of Whitehall Walk, St Neots, Cambridgeshire, was convicted of being involved in the drugs ring after documents recording the number of crates of cannabis being sent from the suppliers in Holland were found on her computer.

She was also employed as a lorry driver and would accompany her boyfriend as he drove the drugs into the UK.

Defending Chater, Mr Jonathan Gosling said she was not involved in the conception of the scheme and only became embroiled due to her relationship with MacKenzie-Crow. Brothers Craig and Darren Hillyer, aged 35 and 42 respectively, pleaded guilty to driving the lorries containing drugs before the trial.

Mr Sunit Sandhu, for Darren Hillyer, of Rosemary Close, Coventry, said: "There is nothing to suggest that he had a lifestyle with large amounts of fancy cars and clothes."

Mr Timothy Hannam, for Craig Hillyer, of Aldermans Green Road, Coventry, added he too had made nothing from the crime.

Over two years, the gang drove scores of lorries containing cannabis into the UK to rented warehouses, including one in Talbots Lane, Brierley Hill. The drugs were unloaded and then collected by dealers from across the country. SOCA said the Dutch suppliers "had been dealt with".