Members of a Liverpool organised crime group were caught making a delivery to a local heroin dealer in Swansea thanks to a covert police operation, a court has heard.
When officers swooped on a pub they found half-a-kilo of the Class A drug worth around £49,000 which had just been delivered to contacts in the Welsh city. Sending five people to prison for their part in a trafficking conspiracy the judge described the trade in heroin as "evil" and said it destroyed communities and brought misery to users.
Ian Wright, prosecuting, told Swansea Crown Court that in the summer of 2022 police in Swansea and Neath Port Talbot launched an investigation into a county lines drug operation after recovering a phone from a user which had been receiving messages from a contact known as "Flakey". Those inquires led officers to uncovering two Liverpudlian drug dealers operating in Swansea - Ryan Dougherty, aged 43, and 40-year-old Neil Cook - who where were using a number of AirBnB rental properties in the city. The prosecutor said it emerged that the Flakey drugs line was sending out bulk text messages offering heroin to some 85 users.
Read next: Get the latest court cases sent to your email inbox with our Crime & Punishment newsletter
The court heard that on July 14 last year Dougherty and Cook arranged to deliver a consignment of heroin to a Neath-based dealer. At lunchtime the Liverpudlians arrived at the recycling point next to the petrol station at the Tesco supermarket in Fforestfach in a car being driven by 21-year-old Swansea woman Chantelle Price - there they met Michael Evans and his partner Nadia Akasha who had travelled to the rendezvous from Skewen in a taxi. The prosecutor said while the group chatted in the layby by the recycling bins a package of drugs was handed over by the Liverpudlians, and Akasha put it into her rucksack.
Dougherty, Cook and Price then drove off but were arrested shortly afterwards in Townhill. Meanwhile 55-year-old Evans and 41-year-old Akasha had gone to the Mary Dillwyn pub across the road from Tesco where officers moved in and arrested them. The court heard when Akasha's rucksack was searched officers found a package of half-a-kilo of heroin wrapped in a tea towel - the street value of the drug if sold as individual deals would have been around £49,000. Evans was found to be carrying £535 in cash, and also had a rock of crack cocaine on him. A subsequent search of Evans' house found weighing scales, a "tick list", wraps of heroin, and seven boxes of Valium tablets.
Neil Terrance John Cook, of Hughes Close, Wavertree, Liverpool; Ryan Paul Dougherty, of no fixed abode; and Chantelle Kiki Price, of Clos John Charles, Cwmbwrla, Swansea, had previously been found guilty at trial of conspiracy to supply heroin when they appeared in the dock for sentencing. During the trial Price had claimed that she had befriended the Liverpudlian visitors in a Brynhyfryd pub and had only been driving them around Swansea to show them the beaches and others attractions. Michael Saunders Evans, of Compton Road, Skewen, Neath, and Nadia Akasha, of Kingdom Owen Road, Neath, had both previously pleaded guilty to the same conspiracy offence. Evans had also previously pleaded guilty to the simple possession of crack and Valium.
Dougherty has a previous conviction for possession of heroin and amphetamine with intent to supply from Truro Crown Court. This offence had seen Dougherty and his accomplice assault an 83-year-old man in Liverpool and steal this car to which the pair then fitted stolen number plates - nine days later the car was picked up in Cornwall and, following a high-speed chase which ended with a crash into a ditch, Dougherty was found to be carrying a kilo of amphetamine and half-a-kilo of heroin. Evans - who was described in court as a "prolific offender" with convictions beginning in the 1980s - has two previous convictions for heroin trafficking, one from Swansea Crown Court and one from Cardiff Crown Court. Cook has previous convictions for possession of cannabis and for inflicting grievous bodily harm. Neither Price nor Akasha have any previous convictions.
Judge Geraint Walters told the defendants that peddling heroin was an "evil trade" which destroyed communities and brought misery to users, and he said each of the people in the dock had played a part in the conspiracy. He said Cook and Dougherty belonged to an organised crime group from Liverpool which was trafficking significant quantities of heroin to Swansea, and on the day the covert police operation caught them they were making a delivery to their local contact Evans. He said Price had been working as a driver for the Liverpudlians - he described her account to the trial jury that she had merely been showing the visitors the attractions of the local area as a "cock and bull story" - while Akasha had accompanied her partner to the rendezvous and taken possession of the heroin.
Dougherty was sentenced to six years in prison; Cook to five years; Evans to 2,045 days; Price to two years; and Akasha to 16 months. The defendants will each spend up to half their sentences in custody before being released on licence to serve the remainder in the community.
An earlier version of this story wrongly stated that Chantelle Price's rucksack had been searched. This was note the case and the article has been updated to make clear that it was Nadia Akasha's rucksack. We are happy to make this clear.
Read next:
Fraud investigator lied to police to cover up stepson's drunken crash
Woman set fire to door of neighbour's flat while she was still inside
You can sign up to our regular Crime and Punishment newsletter here while this interactive tool allows you to check the latest crime statistics for your area:
