Eight years for tanning shop boss who was drug lord

The boss of a Black Country tanning salon chain was today starting an eight-year jail sentence after a major police operation unmasked him as an armed drug dealer.

Cunning Darren Bradley was caught with cannabis worth more than £38,000, while a handgun was found stashed in a first aid kit at his mother's house.

Detectives believe Bradley was receiving the drugs before selling them on to another dealer. And today the Express & Star can reveal how Bradley's own CCTV system led to his downfall as it filmed him rummaging in a car boot amongst the drugs just hours before police stormed his house.

One hundred officers raided homes and businesses connected with Bradley, including four Elite Tanning salons around Wolverhampton and Dudley which he ran with his wife, Sharon, in February.

In the boot of his Vauxhall Vectra, outside the couple's £450,000 house on Penn Road, near Penn Common, they found 7.6kg of potent skunk cannabis.

At his 65-year-old mother's house on Bilston's Britannia Road, they found a 9mm Russian-made Baikal pistol and eight 9mm bullets. Bradley's mother was initially arrested but later released without charge.

Yesterday Sharon Bradley wept in court as her husband was jailed for five years for possession of a firearm, and three years to run consecutively for conspiracy to supply cannabis.

Mrs Bradley, who faced the same drugs charge as her husband, walked free after it was ordered to lie on the file.