Latest news with #DavidBilsland
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Yahoo
The ‘Godfather' gang wars tearing Scotland apart
Credit: Sky News Officers working for Border Force knew the routine. For six months, they had been checking consignments of fruit arriving at the Port of Dover from Latin America. They had done it 17 times, without finding anything of significance. But at the eighteenth time of asking, in September 2020, they struck gold. Within dozens of cardboard boxes of bananas that had arrived from Ecuador were 119 parcels, wrapped tightly in silver foil. When the officers cut through the packages, they found 952 blocks of cocaine – one tonne of it in total – with a street value of between £75 and £100 million. The boxes were addressed to David Bilsland, a Glasgow fruit merchant who was linked to one of Scotland's most wanted criminals, Jamie Stevenson, known as 'The Iceman' because of his reputation for cold-blooded ruthlessness. The discovery of the cocaine and the eventual arrest and conviction of Stevenson – once called Scotland's answer to Tony Soprano – along with Bilsland and others, was the start of a trail that has now culminated in a battle for supremacy over the Scottish drugs market – one that has brought violence to the streets of Glasgow and Edinburgh on a scale that has not been witnessed in recent years. The fighting has rekindled a bitter decades-long feud between rival Scottish crime families and sparked fresh hostilities with a shady drugs syndicate operating from the Middle East. Locals have compared the horrifying scenes to a modern-day version of The Godfather. 'Every time police have a success, like the Stevenson case, it has repercussions in the criminal world,' says Simon McLean, a former undercover police officer who worked for the serious crime squad in Glasgow. 'The criminals look to see how vulnerable they are… they start looking inwards and at scapegoats – and violence is their answer to everything. When police have a success, it's actually pouring petrol on the fire,' he adds. The flames have been there for all to see. Over six weeks in March and April, there were more than a dozen arson attacks in the two cities, with cars, homes, garages and businesses set alight. In other incidents, shots have been fired and two people, a pensioner and a 12-year-old boy, seriously assaulted by men wearing masks. After a brief lull, the violence erupted again this month, with a car firebombed in Edinburgh and, in the early hours of Tuesday this week, a house set on fire in Glasgow. Perpetrators have filmed some of the attacks and posted the chilling footage on social media to boast about what they'd done and goad their opponents. In response to the wave of violence, Police Scotland has stepped up street patrols in local communities and set up a dedicated team of detectives to investigate the crimes. So far, they have arrested 32 suspects, charging 20, and carried out a series of raids, gathering cash and mobile phones, and seizing firearms from properties in South Queensferry, a town just west of Edinburgh. 'We believe these incidents are linked to rival groups who are targeting each other,' Det Ch Supt David Ferry said in a statement last month. 'We will not stop until we bring those responsible for this criminality to justice.' The violence has frightening echoes of savage street conflicts in Glasgow from years gone by, such as between the 'razor' gangs of the 1920s and 30s, teenage mobs from high-rise estates during the 1960s, and rival vendors selling drugs and stolen goods in the 1980s 'ice cream wars'. And it is a painful reminder that although violent crime in Scotland has fallen substantially over the past 20 years – with a focus on prevention and support for those at risk – organised crime groups continue to pose a significant threat. 'Those involved in organised crime have had a fairly joyful time developing their business – with the odd casualty, as law enforcement intervenes,' says Graeme Pearson, a former head of the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency. Government apathy hasn't helped. 'Most of those who might have been able to change [the situation] have lacked the commitment to see things through and have prioritised other areas, such as the NHS and education,' says Pearson, who served in the Scottish Parliament for five years and was Labour's Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Justice. 'Organised crime was overlooked and the wealth and power of those people has developed and become more confident.' Pearson's views are shared by other retired officers who claim the police service opted for a 'softer' approach to organised crime. 'You need to keep your foot on the neck of the violence,' says one. Indeed, the latest Scottish Government report on the work of the pan-agency Serious Organised Crime Taskforce (SOCT) paints a troubling picture. It says there are 90 serious organised crime groups (SOCGs) operating in Scotland and more than 1,400 people involved in criminal activity. In March last year, 158 crime group members were in prison. Although the tentacles of the criminal underworld reach into human trafficking, prostitution, child sexual abuse, fraud and money laundering, it is drugs which present the biggest draw – and where the largest profits can be made. As experts from the University of the West of Scotland concluded in a study last year, Scottish organised crime has become 'cemented' on the supply of drugs – even if the nature of the problem has changed. In the mid-1990s, when three men were shot dead during some of Scotland's bloodiest underworld skirmishes in Paisley, a town to the west of Glasgow, the violence revolved around control of the market for heroin and tranquillisers, estimated at the time to be worth around £200 million. Not any more. 'I attribute all of it to cocaine,' says Mark Dempster, a Glaswegian-born former international drug smuggler who turned his life around and now works as an addiction counsellor. 'Over the last 15 years it's become a massive issue. Cocaine use has become normalised – people drink less to pay for their cocaine. It's become so lucrative for the gangs, they're bringing in shipments, with a massive customer base, and they're fighting over these territories.' The SOCT report says 56 serious organised crime groups are involved in drug crime, with cocaine and cannabis the 'most common commodities' supplied. And in Scotland, where a gram of cocaine can cost as little as £40, there are plenty of customers. By 2011, Scotland had acquired the unfortunate label 'cocaine capital' of the world, after the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime reported that almost four per cent of people used the drug, more than any other country. Since then, the problem has spiralled. Scotland has the worst drug death rate in Europe, at 277 fatalities per million people – over twice the level for England, Wales and Northern Ireland – with cocaine increasingly implicated. According to National Records of Scotland, cocaine was a factor in 41 per cent of 1,172 drug-related deaths in 2023 – up from six per cent in 2008. 'When I was a young officer and went to a drugs death it was predominantly heroin,' says 'Stuart', a recently-retired policeman from Scotland who spent three decades in the service. 'Towards the end of my career it was cocaine, the most prevalent and highest-profit.' Stevenson, the drug trafficker, benefited from the switch to cocaine – until the Ecuador banana plot he'd masterminded was foiled. Having fled the UK, the 60-year-old was named on CrimeStoppers' list of most wanted fugitives and captured in 2022 while out jogging in the Netherlands. When he and his five co-conspirators were jailed last October, it disrupted the drugs market in Scotland and unsettled the suppliers. 'There was a lot of money from that operation, some proceeds of crime recovered – there'll be scores to be settled,' says Simon McLean, who presents the Crime Time Inc podcast and campaigns for reform of the drugs laws. 'Someone always pays – when you do a bust, someone loses their money.' The evidence which underpinned the investigation into Stevenson came from encrypted phone messages on a system run by a European-based communication network, Encrochat. In early 2020, French police, assisted by the Dutch and British authorities, cracked the Encrochat code giving them access to millions of messages exchanged by criminals, including Stevenson. In the UK, the operation, known as Operation Venetic, has led to more than 3,000 arrests and over 1,200 convictions. Tony Saggers, who was head of Drugs Threat and Intelligence at the National Crime Agency during a 30-year career in UK law enforcement, says Venetic was the 'most significant' operation against drug markets ever conducted – in terms of the intelligence gleaned, criminal assets recovered and the powerful signal sent to crime bosses that they were not untouchable. But Saggers suspects that Venetic has led to opportunities for other drug gangs to capitalise on what he describes as the 'relentless' demand for cocaine. 'In the case of a very large success or impact, where someone who was previously in charge at 'wholesale' international level gets taken out of the picture, either those remaining in their SOCG attempt business as usual, depending on to what extent they have been disrupted, or their competitors see it as an opportunity to take the place of someone influential. 'Then, it's not just about vying for market place – it's about vying for reputation,' says Saggers. In Scotland, with Stevenson serving a 16-year prison sentence (though still said to be pulling the strings from his cell), other SOCGs have taken the chance to strengthen their footprint in the cocaine market. One group is the Edinburgh-based 'Richardson clan', associates of Mark Richardson, who's serving a prison term for possessing a Glock handgun and fleeing from police during a high-speed car chase, having previously been jailed over one of the biggest seizures of class A drugs in Scotland. There's also the 'Daniel' crime family, from Glasgow, whose founder, Jamie Daniel, turned from scrap metal dealer to heroin smuggler before his death in 2016. They've been engaged in a 20-year violent feud with another Glasgow-based crime family, 'the Lyons'. Added to the mix is a high-level criminal from Dubai, known as Mr Big, who is thought to be trying to wrest control of the market from the Richardson's and the Daniel's through a faceless group going by the name Tamo Junto, which means 'we're together' or 'we're in this together' in Brazilian Portuguese. Tamo Junto are believed to be behind videos that have emerged of the recent firebomb attacks. Earlier this week, they posted a brazen clip on social media showing what appeared to be members of the gang breaking into a residential home in broad daylight. One of the masked trio can be seen battering down the front door with a weapon while two others vault through a ground floor window. One message posted online by the group reads: 'We are urging everyone in Scotland on the streets and those incarcerated to join us in the fight against Mark Richardson and the Daniels [sic] family.' Although some of the addresses targeted are reportedly linked to the Daniel's and the Richardson's, Police Scotland haven't commented on the SOCGs involved in the violence or what triggered it. Ex-officer 'Stuart' says the criminals will seize on any snippets of information they learn about the investigation to stay one step ahead. 'These people are so savvy, they debrief and learn from court cases and what their lawyers tell them. 'You also need to factor in the gangs' awareness of police tactics, thanks to endless TV shows,' he adds. An even bigger challenge facing police in Scotland as they counter the gang threat is a dearth of specialist capabilities, such as surveillance teams, due to staff cutbacks. The number of officers across the force has fallen by more than 900 in the last five years, to 16,507, and surveillance, which is particularly resource intensive, has been badly hit. Calum Steele, who spent 30 years in the police, including 14 as general secretary of the Scottish Police Federation, says the loss of experienced uniformed officers on the ground is especially keenly felt. 'Police are very good at swarming around after something has happened, with extra reassurance patrols – but they don't do that forever and invariably the passage of time sees them withdrawing and coming out of the trouble-spots,' he says. Steele laments the lack of 'good old-fashioned tradecraft' by detectives who 'knew who to speak to, how to speak to them and what to say'. He fears that despite the progress Police Scotland are making tracking down those responsible for the firebombings and shootings, the gang violence will continue without officers gathering intelligence on the ground. 'While they may identify the perpetrators, many of the 'red flags' that will be there will not be getting picked up by the police,' says Steele. It's a chastening thought. The takedown of Stevenson's gang, the extraordinary success of Operation Venetic and the police response to the latest wave of violence will not, it seems, be enough to prevent the callous cocaine-trading criminal networks from unleashing more terror onto the streets of Scotland to expand their market share and protect their reputations. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Telegraph
16-05-2025
- Telegraph
The ‘Godfather' gang wars tearing Scotland apart
Officers working for Border Force knew the routine. For six months, they had been checking consignments of fruit arriving at the Port of Dover from Latin America. They had done it 17 times, without finding anything of significance. But at the eighteenth time of asking, in September 2020, they struck gold. Within dozens of cardboard boxes of bananas that had arrived from Ecuador were 119 parcels, wrapped tightly in silver foil. When the officers cut through the packages, they found 952 blocks of cocaine – one tonne of it in total – with a street value of between £75 and £100 million. The boxes were addressed to David Bilsland, a Glasgow fruit merchant who was linked to one of Scotland's most wanted criminals, Jamie Stevenson, known as 'The Iceman' because of his reputation for cold-blooded ruthlessness. The discovery of the cocaine and the eventual arrest and conviction of Stevenson – once called Scotland's answer to Tony Soprano – along with Bilsland and others, was the start of a trail that has now culminated in a battle for supremacy over the Scottish drugs market – one that has brought violence to the streets of Glasgow and Edinburgh on a scale that has not been witnessed in recent years. The fighting has rekindled a bitter decades-long feud between rival Scottish crime families and sparked fresh hostilities with a shady drugs syndicate operating from the Middle East. Locals have compared the horrifying scenes to a modern-day version of The Godfather. 'Every time police have a success, like the Stevenson case, it has repercussions in the criminal world,' says Simon McLean, a former undercover police officer who worked for the serious crime squad in Glasgow. 'The criminals look to see how vulnerable they are… they start looking inwards and at scapegoats – and violence is their answer to everything. When police have a success, it's actually pouring petrol on the fire,' he adds. A wave of violence The flames have been there for all to see. Over six weeks in March and April, there were more than a dozen arson attacks in the two cities, with cars, homes, garages and businesses set alight. In other incidents, shots have been fired and two people, a pensioner and a 12-year-old boy, seriously assaulted by men wearing masks. After a brief lull, the violence erupted again this month, with a car firebombed in Edinburgh and, in the early hours of Tuesday this week, a house set on fire in Glasgow. Perpetrators have filmed some of the attacks and posted the chilling footage on social media to boast about what they'd done and goad their opponents. In response to the wave of violence, Police Scotland has stepped up street patrols in local communities and set up a dedicated team of detectives to investigate the crimes. So far, they have arrested 32 suspects, charging 20, and carried out a series of raids, gathering cash and mobile phones, and seizing firearms from properties in South Queensferry, a town just west of Edinburgh. 'We believe these incidents are linked to rival groups who are targeting each other,' Det Ch Supt David Ferry said in a statement last month. 'We will not stop until we bring those responsible for this criminality to justice.' The violence has frightening echoes of savage street conflicts in Glasgow from years gone by, such as between the 'razor' gangs of the 1920s and 30s, teenage mobs from high-rise estates during the 1960s, and rival vendors selling drugs and stolen goods in the 1980s 'ice cream wars'. And it is a painful reminder that although violent crime in Scotland has fallen substantially over the past 20 years – with a focus on prevention and support for those at risk – organised crime groups continue to pose a significant threat. 'Those involved in organised crime have had a fairly joyful time developing their business – with the odd casualty, as law enforcement intervenes,' says Graeme Pearson, a former head of the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency. Government apathy hasn't helped. 'Most of those who might have been able to change [the situation] have lacked the commitment to see things through and have prioritised other areas, such as the NHS and education,' says Pearson, who served in the Scottish Parliament for five years and was Labour's Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Justice. 'Organised crime was overlooked and the wealth and power of those people has developed and become more confident.' Pearson's views are shared by other retired officers who claim the police service opted for a 'softer' approach to organised crime. 'You need to keep your foot on the neck of the violence,' says one. Indeed, the latest Scottish Government report on the work of the pan-agency Serious Organised Crime Taskforce (SOCT) paints a troubling picture. It says there are 90 serious organised crime groups (SOCGs) operating in Scotland and more than 1,400 people involved in criminal activity. In March last year, 158 crime group members were in prison. 'I attribute all of it to cocaine' Although the tentacles of the criminal underworld reach into human trafficking, prostitution, child sexual abuse, fraud and money laundering, it is drugs which present the biggest draw – and where the largest profits can be made. As experts from the University of the West of Scotland concluded in a study last year, Scottish organised crime has become 'cemented' on the supply of drugs – even if the nature of the problem has changed. In the mid-1990s, when three men were shot dead during some of Scotland's bloodiest underworld skirmishes in Paisley, a town to the west of Glasgow, the violence revolved around control of the market for heroin and tranquillisers, estimated at the time to be worth around £200 million. Not any more. 'I attribute all of it to cocaine,' says Mark Dempster, a Glaswegian-born former international drug smuggler who turned his life around and now works as an addiction counsellor. 'Over the last 15 years it's become a massive issue. Cocaine use has become normalised – people drink less to pay for their cocaine. It's become so lucrative for the gangs, they're bringing in shipments, with a massive customer base, and they're fighting over these territories.' The SOCT report says 56 serious organised crime groups are involved in drug crime, with cocaine and cannabis the 'most common commodities' supplied. And in Scotland, where a gram of cocaine can cost as little as £40, there are plenty of customers. By 2011, Scotland had acquired the unfortunate label 'cocaine capital' of the world, after the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime reported that almost four per cent of people used the drug, more than any other country. Since then, the problem has spiralled. Scotland has the worst drug death rate in Europe, at 277 fatalities per million people – over twice the level for England, Wales and Northern Ireland – with cocaine increasingly implicated. According to National Records of Scotland, cocaine was a factor in 41 per cent of 1,172 drug-related deaths in 2023 – up from six per cent in 2008. 'When I was a young officer and went to a drugs death it was predominantly heroin,' says 'Stuart', a recently-retired policeman from Scotland who spent three decades in the service. 'Towards the end of my career it was cocaine, the most prevalent and highest-profit.' A battle for the drugs market – and reputation Stevenson, the drug trafficker, benefited from the switch to cocaine – until the Ecuador banana plot he'd masterminded was foiled. Having fled the UK, the 60-year-old was named on CrimeStoppers' list of most wanted fugitives and captured in 2022 while out jogging in the Netherlands. When he and his five co-conspirators were jailed last October, it disrupted the drugs market in Scotland and unsettled the suppliers. 'There was a lot of money from that operation, some proceeds of crime recovered – there'll be scores to be settled,' says Simon McLean, who presents the Crime Time Inc podcast and campaigns for reform of the drugs laws. 'Someone always pays – when you do a bust, someone loses their money.' The evidence which underpinned the investigation into Stevenson came from encrypted phone messages on a system run by a European-based communication network, Encrochat. In early 2020, French police, assisted by the Dutch and British authorities, cracked the Encrochat code giving them access to millions of messages exchanged by criminals, including Stevenson. In the UK, the operation, known as Operation Venetic, has led to more than 3,000 arrests and over 1,200 convictions. Tony Saggers, who was head of Drugs Threat and Intelligence at the National Crime Agency during a 30-year career in UK law enforcement, says Venetic was the 'most significant' operation against drug markets ever conducted – in terms of the intelligence gleaned, criminal assets recovered and the powerful signal sent to crime bosses that they were not untouchable. But Saggers suspects that Venetic has led to opportunities for other drug gangs to capitalise on what he describes as the 'relentless' demand for cocaine. 'In the case of a very large success or impact, where someone who was previously in charge at 'wholesale' international level gets taken out of the picture, either those remaining in their SOCG attempt business as usual, depending on to what extent they have been disrupted, or their competitors see it as an opportunity to take the place of someone influential. 'Then, it's not just about vying for market place – it's about vying for reputation,' says Saggers. Rival clans In Scotland, with Stevenson serving a 16-year prison sentence (though still said to be pulling the strings from his cell), other SOCGs have taken the chance to strengthen their footprint in the cocaine market. One group is the Edinburgh-based 'Richardson clan', associates of Mark Richardson, who's serving a prison term for possessing a Glock handgun and fleeing from police during a high-speed car chase, having previously been jailed over one of the biggest seizures of class A drugs in Scotland. There's also the 'Daniel' crime family, from Glasgow, whose founder, Jamie Daniel, turned from scrap metal dealer to heroin smuggler before his death in 2016. They've been engaged in a 20-year violent feud with another Glasgow-based crime family, 'the Lyons'. Added to the mix is a high-level criminal from Dubai, known as Mr Big, who is thought to be trying to wrest control of the market from the Richardson's and the Daniel's through a faceless group going by the name Tamo Junto, which means 'we're together' or 'we're in this together' in Brazilian Portuguese. Tamo Junto are believed to be behind videos that have emerged of the recent firebomb attacks. Earlier this week, they posted a brazen clip on social media showing what appeared to be members of the gang breaking into a residential home in broad daylight. One of the masked trio can be seen battering down the front door with a weapon while two others vault through a ground floor window. One message posted online by the group reads: 'We are urging everyone in Scotland on the streets and those incarcerated to join us in the fight against Mark Richardson and the Daniels [sic] family.' @tmj2025 These 🐀's shouting on comments this n that but here a video that proves there being hunted down and it's not just 🔥 and running 🏃♂️ away scared 😱 there has been not one come back to anything that's happened as was mentioned in papers yesterday nothing back as yet has happened to the MR BIG who's 📦 where stolen up the TMJ2025 yasss #edinburgh #glasgow #gangster #tmj #tmjdisorder #tmj2025 #gangland #jailtok #hmpprison #hmpscotland #danielsglagow #dainlesvirus #markrichardson #tmjtreatment #tmjglasgow #danielsgangland #edinburghscotland #hmpeasy #heepsy #davidtogher ♬ original sound - #TMJ2025# Although some of the addresses targeted are reportedly linked to the Daniel's and the Richardson's, Police Scotland haven't commented on the SOCGs involved in the violence or what triggered it. Ex-officer 'Stuart' says the criminals will seize on any snippets of information they learn about the investigation to stay one step ahead. 'These people are so savvy, they debrief and learn from court cases and what their lawyers tell them. 'You also need to factor in the gangs' awareness of police tactics, thanks to endless TV shows,' he adds. Police cutbacks undermining the crackdown An even bigger challenge facing police in Scotland as they counter the gang threat is a dearth of specialist capabilities, such as surveillance teams, due to staff cutbacks. The number of officers across the force has fallen by more than 900 in the last five years, to 16,507, and surveillance, which is particularly resource intensive, has been badly hit. Calum Steele, who spent 30 years in the police, including 14 as general secretary of the Scottish Police Federation, says the loss of experienced uniformed officers on the ground is especially keenly felt. 'Police are very good at swarming around after something has happened, with extra reassurance patrols – but they don't do that forever and invariably the passage of time sees them withdrawing and coming out of the trouble-spots,' he says. Steele laments the lack of 'good old-fashioned tradecraft' by detectives who 'knew who to speak to, how to speak to them and what to say'. He fears that despite the progress Police Scotland are making tracking down those responsible for the firebombings and shootings, the gang violence will continue without officers gathering intelligence on the ground. 'While they may identify the perpetrators, many of the 'red flags' that will be there will not be getting picked up by the police,' says Steele. It's a chastening thought. The takedown of Stevenson's gang, the extraordinary success of Operation Venetic and the police response to the latest wave of violence will not, it seems, be enough to prevent the callous cocaine-trading criminal networks from unleashing more terror onto the streets of Scotland to expand their market share and protect their reputations.
