Two crime bosses and members of a gang who supplied fraudulent passports - including to 'Premier League' cocaine kingpin Michael Moogan - have been convicted following an investigation spanning five years.
Anthony Beard, 61, and Christopher Zietek, 67, were caught providing fraudulently-obtained genuine passports (FOGs) to organised criminals in a covert sting.
Members of the criminal underworld paid between £5,0000 and £15,000 for the highly sought-after documents, which were issued authentically but applied for using false information.
They were supplied to a number of high-profile offenders including the UK's former most wanted fugitive Michael Moogan. Drugs baron Moogan, 37, has been described as 'a major figure in international drug dealing' and who a judge said was operating at 'Premier League level' when he flooded the UK with 62 kilos of cocaine.
He spent eight years on the run after learning the National Crime Agency (NCA) were after him. He was eventually arrested in Dubai in 2021 and was last week jailed for 12 years at Manchester Crown Court.
Others to receive passports from Beard and Zietek's group were Glasgow murderers Jordan Owen and Christopher Hughes, Manchester fugitive David Walley, and suspected drug traffickers Barrie Gillespie, Jamie Stevenson and James White reports the Liverpool Echo.
An investigation by the NCA, codenamed Operation Strey, started in 2017 and ran in partnership with Dutch National Police and HM Passport Office - and was one of the most significant operations carried out in recent years. Beard and Zietek's crime group exploited vulnerable people - often with drink or drug issues - who were around the same age as their clients and with similar facial features.
They were paid for providing their expired passports and their details were then used to apply for new ones but with photographs of the criminals. The organised crime group (OCG) also paid others to countersign passport applications.
Beard, from Sydenham, London, was an expert in FOGs and NCA officers believe he had been procuring them for 20 years. He was involved in every aspect of organising and applying for the passports, including collecting application forms and planning the details to be provided by the applicant and the counter-signatory.
His fingerprints were found on many of the forms, and contact numbers he included were for a large number of burner phones he operated. Handwriting experts established he completed most of the application forms, and a voice recognition specialist determined Beard called HM Passport Office to chase up applications pretending to be the people named on the forms.
Zietek, who was formerly known as Christopher McCormack and was believed to be an enforcer for the Adams crime family in London, split his time between Sydenham, Ireland and Spain. He acted as the FOG broker and exploited his criminal connections to obtain clients for the crime group.
The NCA captured audio recordings in Zietek’s house of incriminating conversations with Beard and others about the application processes and their customers. Officers also went undercover to deliver some of the passports. Both men were arrested during coordinated raids in October 2021.
Between them, charges were brought for offences of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, conspiracy to make a false instrument with intent (passports and ID documents), and money laundering.
Beard changed his plea to guilty on January 3 2023, the first day of a nine-week trial at Reading Crown Court. Zietek was found guilty on March 17.
NCA deputy director Craig Turner said: "This organised crime group supplied fraudulent passports that enabled some of the UK’s most serious and dangerous criminals to operate internationally under false identities and pose a sustained threat to the public. The investigation demonstrates the NCA’s unique role in tackling the most serious and complex crime threats facing the UK.
"We have identified a chronic, under-the-radar conspiracy that enabled drug and firearm traffickers, murderers and fugitives to evade justice, and we have worked across borders to dismantle it and the bring the masterminds to account.
"The NCA continues to protect the UK from the serious and organised criminals who present a threat to our security, people and economy."
Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) specialist prosecutor Giorgina Venturella said: "The service provided by the defendants in this organised crime group enabled serious criminals, including drug and firearm traffickers and murderers, to go on the run as fugitives to evade detection and conduct criminal business internationally under false identities.
"Following collaboration with the NCA, the CPS was able to build a strong case resulting in their conviction, disrupting a major organised crime network and helping to dismantle their illegal operation."
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