A couple phoned 999 to report a bogus kidnapping – in a failed bid to stop a £250million drug bust. Erin Lee and Michael Hardie were trying to thwart cops probing their drug ring.
Seven more people were caged over their roles in the narcotics gang during court hearings yesterday. The multimillion-pound drug racket saw drugs taken to a farm.
The farm was used as a drug factory, with the class A substances in question repackaged and then sent out to couriers who ferried them across the country.
Liverpool Echo reports a comprehensive investigation was carried out by the North West Regional Organised Crime Unit (NWROCU), focused on Deeside, in Flintshire, Wales.
The operation uncovered the importation of over two tonnes of class A drugs into the UK. Earlier this year, Guy Remington, Luke Hirst, Morgan Towner, and Thomas Smith received a combined 55-year sentence after detectives successfully dismantled the gang.
On September 20 last year, after the group’s ninth and final drug run to Europe, officers from the NWROCU and North Wales Police arrested Remington while he was unloading his trailer at the farm.
Charles Dilworth, 25, of Churston Road in Childwall, fled the scene and later left the country. He was arrested at Manchester airport upon his return and has been jailed for seven years and six months after pleading guilty to conspiracy to supply Class A drugs.
Dilworth’s getaway car, a black Range Rover, was spotted by police in the area. Sisters Alesha and Erin Lee and Erin’s partner Michael Hardie visited the farm on the day or the police raid.
Five minutes later, Erin Lee and her partner Michael Hardie made a false 999 call claiming they had been kidnapped at knifepoint on their way to a local bar.
In audio released by police, Lee can be heard making the false 999 call with Hardie in the background. She tells the operator: “Hiya, erm we have just been driving…erm…where about are we?”
Hardie can be heard saying “in Wales”. Lee can then be heard saying: “We’re in Wales, we have just been driving and we pulled up – we were going for breakfast in The Tavern by like Pinfold Lane and some guy he’s just jumped in the car and he had a knife.
“He just told us to drive and we’ve got a baby in the car, so we just drove. Obviously we didn’t know what was going on.” The operator then asks to repeat where they are and Lee can be heard saying “we were going for breakfast at the Tavern.”
A quick search by officers revealed that the bar had been closed since 2016. They were later arrested and convicted for attempting to pervert the course of justice.
Hardie, 32, of Makin Street in Walton was jailed for 12 months. Erin Lee, 22, of Netherfield Road South, Liverpool and Alesha Lee, 24, of Smithdown Road, Liverpool both received an eight month sentence suspended for 18 months.
Also sentenced were drugs suppliers and couriers from Liverpool, South Yorkshire, and London. Jon Fairclough, 37, of William Jessop Way, in the city centre was jailed for seven years after pleading guilty to conspiracy to supply Class A drugs.
He was a courier who made six drugs runs to the farm, distributing the drugs across the Liverpool area. David Hague, 50, of Owston Road, Doncaster was jailed for 9 years and four months after pleading guilty to possession with intent to supply Class A drugs.
He was a drug supplier from South Yorkshire who visited the farm eight times. Jamie Menagh, 30, of Waterloo Quay, Liverpool was jailed for seven years and six months after pleading guilty to possession with intent to supply Class A drugs.
Menagh was spotted on the farm’s CCTV loading drugs into his van. He was a Class A drug supplier in Liverpool who helped the organised crime group distribute drugs to other couriers who visited the farm.
Michael Day, 36, of Manchester Road in Prescot was jailed for six years after pleading guilty to conspiracy to supply Class A drugs. Day was also a courier who visited the farm.
Mark Blower, 32, of Dartmouth Park Avenue, London was a London supplier who was controlling Morgan Towner, jailed back in March this year. Blower was jailed for 14 years and three months for conspiracy to supply Class A drugs.
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