Latest news with #drugempire
The Sun
3 days ago
- The Sun
Luxury-loving engineer, 31, who ran drug empire to fund lavish holidays & buy second home ordered to pay back just £96k
A LUXURY-loving woman ran a cannabis and cocaine empire to fund a lavish lifestyle of foreign holidays and expensive treats - before being rumbled after a costly mistake. But Danielle Stafford has now been ordered to pay more than £96,000 back as the proceeds of crime, and she's got just 12 weeks to stump up the cash. 8 8 8 The 31-year-old made so much money by selling drugs that she bought a second house and lived without touching any of her job salary. She pretended that most of the expensive items that were found were not designer goods but were fake or had merely been given to her by family members from their foreign holidays. She was caught when police spotted her speeding. A phone constantly rang with 30 calls or pinged with up to 20 drug messages after she was arrested and police later found £26,917 cash stashed around her home and drugs with a street value of £33,600. She had luxuries including nine watches and three expensive Louis Vuitton handbags, Hull Crown Court heard. Engineer and University of Hull graduate Stafford, 31, formerly of Hallgate, Cottingham, was jailed for seven-and-a-half years in April 2023 after she admitted three offences of being concerned in supplying heroin, crack cocaine and cannabis and another of possessing cash as criminal property, on dates spanning October 2017 and May 2020. But the case resurfaced and was mentioned again so that the court could make a final decision on how much money Stafford was said to have made from her criminal activities. Nadim Bashir, prosecuting, said that the criminal benefit figure had been agreed at £96,263. She was ordered to pay it within three months – or face a default prison sentence of one year, to be served consecutively. Stafford attended the hearing via a video link from prison. Moment gutted lag is arrested at prison gates as he LEAVES jail after drug-dealing from his cell The matter had originally been scheduled to be a contested full hearing but agreement was reached between the sides. During the original court hearing in 2023, Mr Bashir said that police spotted a silver Audi heading along Priory Road towards Hull city centre at 7.30pm on May 12, 2020. It was speeding and hastily turned onto Hotham Road South, cutting the corner and cutting up a vehicle heading in the opposite direction. "It was then driven at speed along Hotham Road South," said Mr Bashir. The car was followed and it was stopped in The Odd Bottle car park on Wold Road. Police could smell cannabis coming from the inside of the car and this aroused their suspicions. She "immediately lied" and told police: "I'll be honest, I've got this" and handed police a small silver wrap containing two buds of cannabis skunk. Police found further bags of cannabis on her, including a food bag containing cannabis skunk and, from a pocket, another food bag containing cannabis skunk. 8 8 8 The car was searched and a carrier bag of cannabis skunk was found behind the driver's seat. An empty tub containing drug residue was found. The total value of the cannabis was £1,308. An iPhone was found, with drug messages on it. "From the moment of seizure of the drugs to the arrival in the police station custody suite, the mobile iPhone was constantly ringing and receiving messages from different people," said Mr Bashir. "Some 30 phone calls were received and 10 to 20 text messages." On the way to the police station, Stafford was seen "fidgeting" with her jogging bottoms and she was asked if she had any more drugs hidden. She said: "Yes, but it's not mine and I don't know what it is. I shoved it down my joggers when you pulled me." Stafford pulled out a bag containing a large amount of small bags of cocaine. There were 56 wraps of crack cocaine, valued at £2,800. Her three-bedroom home in Cottingham was searched after police forced entry. A glass jar with plastic bags inside was found hidden behind a bag of coal bricks in a coal bunker in the rear garden. From the moment of seizure of the drugs to the arrival in the police station custody suite, the mobile iPhone was constantly ringing and receiving messages from different people Nadim Bashirprosecuting There were 270 wraps of crack cocaine, valued at £13,500, and 205 wraps of heroin, valued at £4,100, in the jar. Stafford denied knowledge of them. In the living room, herbal cannabis, valued at £2,500, was found in an open, empty banana box on a table. She denied that it belonged to her. Two glass jars contained cannabis valued at £370. Police also found weighing scales, a large amount of cash and more food bags. She admitted that this belonged to her. In Stafford's bedroom, £430 cash and £25.36 in coins were found. Herbal cannabis and Ecstasy tablets were found. Bank notes totalling £670 were found as well as £2,350 and £1,480 cash. More cash, totalling £7,580, was found in a safe but she denied that it was hers. Three Louis Vuitton handbags and nine watches were found. She admitted that these were hers. 8 8 In an upstairs box room, cash bundles of £9,100, £1,668, £550, £700, £1,110, £165, £190 and £91 were found. Examination of Stafford's bank accounts revealed that "she clearly had an additional stream of cash income" apart from her monthly wages from working for Swift Group. Holidays had been taken but there was no trace from her bank account of her buying foreign currency or making purchases overseas. "Again, evidence of an additional cash stream income," said Mr Bashir. Stafford had bought her Cottingham home in March 2016 for £124,999 in her sole name with a mortgage and a property in Hotham Road South in July 2018 without a mortgage for £68,500 in equal shares with her aunt. Stafford paid the "lion's share" of £64,927 from cashing in premium bonds and she told police that she bought it to rent out. "Even with rental or lodgings allowances, neither property was able to provide any significant source of income to justify the cash found in the house," said Mr Bashir. During police interview, Stafford claimed that a Liverpool lad had been staying with her on and off and that he had telephoned her to say that he had left something at her home. She had somehow managed to avoid her drug dealing activities coming to the attention of the police for a substantial period of time. Nadim BashirProsecuting When she got home, there was a large amount of cannabis and, when he asked her to take it to him, she said that she did not feel comfortable doing so. She claimed that he asked her just to bring a bag which was there and, in a panic, she grabbed a bag and was driving to meet him. Stafford denied that she or the lad were dealing drugs but later admitted that she would drive to Liverpool and bring him back to Hull. She denied knowledge of any of the large amounts of cash found around her home, claiming that she looked after it for the lad, including keeping it for him in her own bedroom, apart from £2,350 which belonged to her. "She said that the money in the safe had nothing to do with her and all the other cash belonged to the lad," said Mr Bashir. He told the court that Stafford was an "enthusiastic" cannabis dealer and progressed to becoming a Class A cocaine dealer. "She had somehow managed to avoid her drug dealing activities coming to the attention of the police for a substantial period of time," said Mr Bashir. "The natural result of this was that she was able to accumulate a substantial amount of wealth, including purchasing an investment property, a house to rent. "Cash found in her home address amounted to £26,917. "The contents of her home address in Hallgate, Cottingham, is strong evidence of the nature of her drugs business. "The amount, type and value of drugs found at her home were substantial. The drugs alone were street valued at £33,600. This is sustained drug dealing." During the 2023 hearing, Saleema Mahmood, mitigating, said that Stafford was street dealing cannabis and regularly and frequently took part in this. She claimed that her involvement in Class A dealing arose through a person from Liverpool. Evidence of any Class A dealing was extremely limited and came from two sets of messages. This came much later than the cannabis enterprise. There was an element of naivety and exploitation in her involvement and she had little influence on those above her in the chain. Stafford claimed that she had only the "odd piece" of designer item and that so-called expensive watches and other items bought were counterfeit or had been bought as presents for her by her family on holidays to places like Turkey and Spain. She also claimed that the family was in the habit of keeping large amounts of cash at home, rather than in a bank, and that she was entrusted to look after them for family members because she was seen as being a "responsible" person who could be "trusted" with money. She had shown remorse for what she had done. There were references from previous employers and others. She had tried to get work and had done voluntary work.
BBC News
3 days ago
- BBC News
How a polo-loving businessman was a secret global drug lord
On the surface, Muhammed Asif Hafeez was an upstanding individual.A global businessman and ambassador of a prestigious London polo club, he rubbed shoulders with the British elite, including members of the Royal also regularly passed on detailed information to the authorities in the UK and Middle East that, in some cases, led to the interception of huge shipments of drugs. He was motivated, he said, simply by what he saw as his "moral obligation to curb and highlight criminal activities".At least, that is what he would have had people reality, Hafeez was himself what US officials described as "one of the world's most prolific drug traffickers".From his residence in the UK, he was the puppet-master of a vast drugs empire, supplying many tonnes of heroin, methamphetamine and hashish from bases in Pakistan and India that were distributed across the world. The gangs he informed on were his rivals - and his motivation was to rid the market of his status in the underworld earned him the moniker "the Sultan".But this criminal power and prestige would not last forever. After a complex joint operation between the British and American authorities, Hafeez, 66, was extradited from the UK in 2023. He pleaded guilty last November. On Friday, he was sentenced to 16 years in a New York prison for conspiring to import drugs - including enough heroin for "millions of doses" - into the US. Having been in custody since 2017, Hafeez's sentence will end in BBC has closely followed Hafeez's case. We have pieced together information from court documents, corporate listings and interviews with people who knew wanted to find out how he managed to stay under the radar for so long - and how he eventually got caught. Hafeez was born in September 1958 to a middle-class family in Lahore, Pakistan. One of six children, his upbringing was comfortable. People in Lahore who knew the family told the BBC that his father had owned a factory near the city. Hafeez also later told a US court that he had trained as a commercial the early 1990s to about the mid-2010s, he ran an outwardly legitimate umbrella company called Sarwani International Corporation, with subsidiary businesses in Pakistan, the UAE and the to its website - which has since been shut down - it sold technical equipment to militaries, governments and police forces throughout the world, including equipment for drug the other businesses under the Sarwani umbrella were a textiles company registered in various countries, an Italian restaurant in Lahore that was a franchise of a well-known Knightsbridge brand, and a company named Tipmoor, based near Windsor to the west of London, which specialised in "polo and equestrian services".These businesses not only afforded him a luxury lifestyle, but secured him access to the UK's most exclusive circles. He was listed as an international ambassador for the prestigious Ham Polo Club for at least three years, from 2009 to 2011. He and his wife Shahina were also photographed chatting to Prince William, and embracing Prince Harry, at the club in Polo Club told the BBC that Hafeez had never been a member of the club, that the club no longer has "ambassadors", and that the current board "has no ties to him". It added that the event at which Hafeez and his wife were photographed meeting the princes "was run by a third party".Sarwani's different global arms were dissolved at various stages in the 2010s, according to their listings on Companies House and equivalent global registries. 'Something fishy going on' A former Sarwani employee based in the UAE told the BBC he suspected there had been "something fishy going on" when he worked for the business, because even big projects were "only paid for in cash". The employee - who has asked not to be identified, for fear of reprisals - said he eventually left the business because he felt uncomfortable with this."There were no [bank] transactions, no records, no existence," he told the would also periodically write letters to the authorities in the UAE and UK informing on rival cartels, under the guise of being a concerned member of the public. The BBC has seen these, as well as letters he received in response from the British Embassy in Dubai and the UK Home Office, thanking him and expressing their appreciation for him getting in Home Office told the BBC it does not comment on individual Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and the Government of Dubai were contacted by the BBC for comment but did not respond. Members of Hafeez's family shared these letters with the BBC in 2018, while he was embroiled in a lengthy legal fight against extradition to the US. They also submitted them to courts in the UK and, later, to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), as evidence that he had been an informant and needed protection. All the courts disagreed and ruled that this was a ploy by Hafeez to rid the market of the ECHR said, was "someone who had brought to the attention of the authorities the criminal conduct of others who he knew to be actual or potential rivals to his substantial criminal enterprise". While Hafeez was writing these letters, a meeting took place in 2014 that - despite him not being there - would lead to his of Hafeez's close associates met a potential buyer from Colombia in a flat in Mombasa, Kenya. They burned a small amount of heroin in order to demonstrate how pure it was, and said they could supply him with any quantity of "100%... white crystal".The supplier of this high-quality heroin, they had told the buyer, was a man from Pakistan known as "the Sultan" - that is, they would soon learn was that the "buyer" from Colombia was actually working undercover for the US's Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). The entire meeting was part of an elaborate sting operation, and had been covertly filmed - footage that has been obtained by the BBC. US court documents reveal the deal was co-ordinated by Baktash and Ibrahim Akasha, two brothers who led a violent cartel in Kenya. Their father was himself a feared kingpin who had been killed in Amsterdam's Red Light District in deal also involved Vijaygiri "Vicky" Goswami, an Indian national who managed the Akashas' October 2014, with the Akashas, Goswami and Hafeez still unaware of who the buyers really were, 99kg of heroin and 2kg of crystal meth were delivered to the fake Colombian traffickers. The Akashas promised to provide hundreds of kilograms more of each drug.A month later, the Akasha brothers and Goswami were arrested in Mombasa. They were released on bail shortly afterwards, and spent over two years fighting extradition to the the background, American law enforcers were working with counterparts in the UK to piece together their case against Hafeez, partly using evidence gathered from devices they had seized when they arrested Goswami and the Akasha brothers. On those, they had found multiple references to Hafeez as a major supplier, and were able to find enough evidence to identify him as "the Sultan".Facing charges in the US didn't stop one of the men, Goswami, from continuing his illegal enterprise. In 2015, while on bail in Kenya, he hatched a plan with Hafeez to transport several tonnes of a drug called ephedrine from a chemical factory in Solapur, India, to a powerful medication that is legal in limited quantities, is used to make methamphetamine. The two men - Goswami and Hafeez - planned to set up a meth factory in Mozambique's capital, Maputo, US court documents show. But their scheme was abandoned in 2016, when police raided the Solapur plant and seized 18 tonnes of Akasha brothers and Goswami finally boarded a flight to the US to face trial in January 2017. Hafeez was arrested eight months later in London, at his flat in the affluent St John's Wood neighbourhood. He was detained at high security Belmarsh Prison in south-east London, and it was from there that he spent six years fighting extradition to the US.A big development happened in 2019 in the US. Goswami pleaded guilty, and told a New York court he had agreed to co-operate with prosecutors. The Akasha brothers also pleaded Akasha was sentenced to 25 years in prison. His brother Ibrahim was sentenced to 23 who is yet to be sentenced, would have testified against Hafeez in the US had the case gone to Belmarsh, Hafeez was running out of tried to stop extradition to the US - but failed to convince magistrates, the High Court in London and the ECHR that he had, in fact, been an informant to the authorities who was "at risk of ill-treatment from his fellow prisoners" as a result. He also claimed the conditions in a US prison would be "inhuman and degrading" for him because of his health conditions, including type 2 diabetes and lost all of these arguments at every stage and was extradited in May case did not go to trial. In November last year, Hafeez pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiring to manufacture and distribute heroin, methamphetamine and hashish and to import them into the US. Pre-sentencing, prosecutors described the "extremely fortunate circumstances" of Hafeez's life, which "throw into harsh relief his decision to scheme... and to profit from the distribution of dangerous substances that destroy lives and whole communities"."Unlike many traffickers whose drug activities are borne, at least in part, from desperation, poverty, and a lack of educational opportunities," they said, "the defendant has lived a life replete with privilege and choice."
