JAILED: Gang members used drones to fly £500k drugs in prisons

A gang who flew £500,000 worth of drugs into prisons using drones made a fatal error which saw them jailed for more than 37 years.

Drones were used to smuggle drugs into jails including Oakwood and Featherstone, near Wolverhampton.

But the sophisticated plot was foiled when one drone went astray and landed short of the intended target.

It provided detectives with the evidence they needed to crack the case.

WATCH: Footage of a prison drone flight

Investigators were able to check the flight plans of the lost drone and discover where it had been before.

The mistake led to the downfall of the drugs crew who were today handed jail terms ranging from three to 10 years.

Gang leader Lee Anslow, who was serving a sentence at HMP Hewell in Worcestershire and is the nephew of notorious drug dealer John Anslow, who was sprung from a prison van in 2012, was found with digital scales and £20,000 worth of cannabis in his cell after police smashed the network.

A court heard how drivers and look-outs conspired with prisoners to smuggle drugs into seven jails, which also included HMP Birmingham and HMP Liverpool.

A total of 11 drones, including some which had crashed, were seized during police inquiries into flights which also targeted prisons in Worcestershire, Cheshire and Lancashire.

The gang were part of a 'wider conspiracy' responsible for around 100 drugs deliveries.

Detectives were keen to tackle this new kind of threat to prison security and will be hopeful the lengthy sentences will deter other crooks from trying a similar trick.

Judge Simon Drew QC - who handed suspended jail terms and a community order to six others involved in the plot at Birmingham Crown Court - said tough sentences were 'essential' to try and stamp out such plots.

Lee Anslow, 31, was jailed for 10 years, while drone pilot Brandon Smith, 24, of Kingsbury Road, Tipton, got seven years behind bars.

Shane Hadlington, of Sycamore Lodge, Oldbury, was sentenced to four years and three months.

Prison inmate Paul Ferguson, 38, was jailed for four years and nine months, while 28-year-old Stefan Rattray, also a serving prisoner, was jailed for four-and-a-half years.

Paul Payne, 33, of Broad Street, in Coseley, and Justin Millington, 24, of no fixed address, were jailed for three years, eight months and three years, four months.

Kingpin Anslow smiled at the public gallery after being jailed, as the judge described him as 'effectively one of the key operation directors' involved in at least 23 drone flights despite being behind bars.

Millington was arrested outside HMP Hewell in January 2017 with a drone carrying cannabis worth £3,000, cocaine hydrochloride and synthetic drugs valued at almost £10,000.

Data recorded by the drones showed where and when they had been flown, allowing officers to link prison drops to same-day practice flights carried out near gang members' homes.

Mobile phone evidence also allowed detectives to piece together contact between conspirators receiving packages inside the jails and those operating drones nearby.

Judge Simon Drew QC told them: "The method you chose to do this was both carefully planned and executed. Each of you played a part in a wider conspiracy which resulted in approximately 100 separate deliveries.

"This was a sophisticated commercial operation and due to the high value placed on drugs and mobile phones in prisons, designed to make those of you who ran the operation hundreds of thousands of pounds in profit."

Judge Drew said drug and mobile phone use in prisons had caused heightened levels of violence, an increase in self-harm and deaths, as well as allowing witness intimidation and illegal financial transactions.

The judge told the plotters: "I have no doubt each one of you knew exactly what you were getting involved in."

Four defendants received suspended six-month prison terms: Stella Deakin, 41, of Boundary Hill, Dudley; Callum McDonough, 25, from Shenley Field Road, Northfield, Birmingham; Jake Blewitt, 21, from Highfield Road, Tipton; and 21-year-old Dwayne Tinker, of Lindridge Drive, Minworth, near Sutton Coldfield.

Richard Harrabin, 28, from Perton Grove, Weoley Castle, Birmingham, was given an 18-month suspended sentence and Ryan Greaves, 21, from Kimberley Walk, Minworth, was given a 12-month community order.

What did the police have to say?

Speaking after the case, Detective Inspector Gareth Williams, of West Midlands Police, said around £110,000 worth of drugs had been recovered from 11 drones.

"A modest estimate would be potentially £500,000 worth of drugs were flown into prisons."

DI Williams said Anslow and other senior members of the gang had regarded themselves as 'untouchable' as they orchestrated the drone drops.

The officer said of Anslow: "He was the key player in this. Not only was he organising drone flights into the prisons that he was in, he was also speaking to other prisoners, such as Paul Ferguson in HMP Risley, to organise flights there as well."

DI Williams added: “This is a landmark case: it’s the biggest drone drug smuggling racket into prisons ever seen in the UK.

“A drone flier, assisted by one or two others, would speak to an inmate on a contraband phone to guide a drone into prison where the attached parcel would be hooked off using sticks.

“Drugs on board the 11 seized drones had an estimated prison value of around £110,000 − so with at least 55 flights that amounts to more than half a million pounds worth of drugs they’ve tried to land behind prison walls.

“The convictions come on the back of a very complex, detailed investigation and I’d like to praise the tenacity and determination of all our investigators, plus the analyst who interrogated large amounts of phone data, who played a part in this success.

“Drug use behind bars fuels violence and self-harm, increasing pressure on prison staff, so it’s vitally important we do all we can to cut off the supply lines - and anyone convicted of supplying banned substances into prisons can soon expect to be inmates themselves."