Drugs gang - with members from Wolverhampton and Stafford - jailed for child exploitation crimes

The eight-person strong gang was jailed for more than 35 years after supplying drugs from across four counties.

The operation, which operated from addresses in the West Midlands, Wiltshire, North Hamptonshire and Staffordshire, was run by Brian Asante, who co-ordinated the business from his addresses in Wolverhampton and Stafford.

Asante was jailed for more than 13 years for his part in the crime, and also being made the subject of a slavery and trafficking prevention order for 160 months.

He was also assisted by eight co-conspirators who lived across the four counties, including Gulam Izdani, who on Wednesday, January 29, was the last to be sentenced. 

Between them, the gang ran supply lines of drugs between February and September 2021 - using mobile phones as contact points for customers, the lines were donned the AB Line and the Jay Line. 

The lines operated outside of the West Midlands, with one supplying drugs into Kettering, Corby, and Peterborough, and the second operating to serve Burton-upon-Trent. 

Investigators caught onto the gang after carrying out detailed phone work and analysis of Automated Number Plate Recognition data, which tracked the offender's movements as they went between towns. 

Asante, 23, of Canberra Drive, Stafford, admitted conspiracy to supply heroin and cocaine and was also found guilty of child exploitation, being jailed for 13 years and four months. 

He was also handed a prevention order, with conditions and measures in place even while he is in prison and upon release, preventing him from committing further offences. 

James Carroll, 46, of Dumble Close, North Hamptonshire, was convicted of recruiting a child with a view of exploiting them. He was jailed for two years.

Maurice Reid, 55, of The Cloisters, Burton-upon-Trent, and Simon McTaggart, 38, of Tettenhall Road, Wolverhampton, were both jailed for six years and 11 months for conspiracy to supply Class A drugs. 

Also jailed for the same offences were Dhillon Swarn, 20, of Wolverhampton Road, Bloxwich, jailed for three years and nine months, and Emma Gill, 42, of Convent Close, Wolverhampton, for three years. 

Maurice Lawrence, 21, of Manitoba Croft, Birmingham, was given a 19-month term, suspended for two years. 

Alicia Cox, 25, of Wesley Road, South Staffordshire, received a 20-month suspended prison term for assisting an organised crime group. 

Izdani, 22, of Luddesdown Road, Swindon, was convicted of conspiracy to supply and was sentenced at Birmingham Crown Court on Wednesday, January 29 to five years and three months.

Detective Sargeant Gavin McGarth, from the County Lines Taskforce at West Midlands Police, said: "This was a significant criminal enterprise which we've dismantled and have now seen the main operators within it being jailed.

"Two of those jail terms also reflect the shameful use of children to ply an illegal drugs trade involving large quantities of heroin and cocaine.

"All too often the young and the vulnerable can be exploited by criminal drug suppliers for their own means.

"In this instance, we have been able to safeguard two children who were embroiled in the set-up but our commitment to break up these supply networks goes on."