National Crime Agency (NCA)

Return to News27 September 2016 A convicted fraudster who was forced to repay more than £1m to victims of a property scam has now been ordered to pay £1.6m in tax on his earnings from drug dealing. Former night club boss Gary Robb, aged 54, was ordered to repay £1.3m last year after he defrauded 57 victims into buying properties in a northern Cyprus development. Not a single house in the Amaranta Valley was completed by his firm AGA Developments. In last year’s landmark civil recovery action the NCA used the 2002 Proceeds of Crime Act to take the money from the scammer and have it returned to his victims. Using tax powers under the act, the NCA has now successfully ar…

Home News Arrested trying to hide in a roof after four years on the run Return to News 27 September 2016 A Birmingham man who went on the run from the NCA has been given a seven year prison sentence, four years after he and his organised crime group were first arrested. Tahir Mahmood, 37, from Kenelm Road in Small Heath, was detained by West Midlands Police on 1 August 2016. He was attempting to climb into the roof space of an out-building at his family’s home at the time. Officers suspected he was back at the address. Mahmood was the outstanding member of an organised crime group which was investigated by the NCA for importing heroin worth around £1 million fro…

Home News Couple tried to smuggle Albanian crime group’s dirty cash through Channel Tunnel Return to News 26 September 20126 A man who attempted to launder money for an Albanian organised crime group has been sentenced to four years in prison. Vladimir Cahani (33) and his wife Ardita (26) from Clapham were stopped at the Channel Tunnel terminal near Folkestone in Kent on 7 June 2014. The couple were travelling with their nine month old baby. Their Audi was searched by Border Force, who found 130,000 Euros (approximately £103,000) in 50 and 100 notes hidden inside the dashboard. National Crime Agency investigators were able to piece together the couple’s movemen…

Home News Tracked down in Greece – six year manhunt ends in 14 year prison sentence Return to News 23 September 2016 A man who used a series of false identities to stay on the run for six years, before being tracked down in Greece and brought back to the UK has been jailed for 14 years. Simon Dutton, age, originally from Bolton, was arrested in the Greek city of Thessaloniki in December 2015, following an operation involving the National Crime Agency and Hellenic Police. He was wanted in connection with a conspiracy to import class A drugs into the UK using an unsuspecting courier service. The cocaine was concealed within four separate shipments from Spain betwee…

Return to News 22 September 2016 A member of an international cyber crime collective was jailed for two years today following an investigation by the National Crime Agency. Nazariy Markuta, 23, of Harlesden, London, was a member of the D33Ds Company network, which in 2012 was responsible for illegally obtaining more than 450,000 customer email addresses and passwords from a major Silicon Valley firm. The group posted a link to the email addresses and passwords on the D33Ds Company online forum set up and administered by Markuta. After conducting its own investigation and working in conjunction with the FBI, the NCA identified Markuta as a key contributor to the grou…

Return to News22 September 2016 Adam Maybury, aged 28, from Burntwood in Staffordshire, who operated the business from a luxury villa in Spain, worked with his mother, sister, cousin and best friend. His mother, Caroline Wakefield, 57, from Burntwood, had texted her son saying "I am getting a bit worried about all your dodgy dealings Adam just be careful x". All five were sentenced to a total of 17 years and nine months at Birmingham Crown Court today following a National Crime Agency investigation with support from Staffordshire Police. The synthetic drugs, which were sourced from Holland, included 4-FA and 4-MEC. They were distributed via the fast parcel system all …

Home News Default sentences for Kent man who failed to pay £4m confiscation order Return to News 16 September 2016 On 9th September 2016, Dover Magistrates’ Court imposed default sentences of 7 years and 4 years in respect of two unpaid confiscation orders, which totalled nearly £4 million. Between September 2006 and December 2011, Anthony Rex Dymott (age 58) from West Malling in Kent was convicted of drug trafficking, money laundering, deception and fraud. On 7th December 2012 Chelmsford Crown Court granted two confiscation orders against Dymott for £2,644,602.40 and £699,521.02. These amounts representing the sum of his benefit from his criminal conduct. Dymo…

Home News Fixer in plane smuggling crime group ordered to hand over £123k Return to News 13 September 2016 A convicted member of a crime group which used a plane to evade border controls, and sought to profit from importing hundreds of kilos of drugs into the UK, has been ordered to hand over £123,000 he made from his criminal activity. Jamie Williams, 39, from Amery Gardens in Romford (below right) was arrested in Pimlico in January 2015 and found to be in possession more than £40,000 and a kilo of cocaine. National Crime Agency and Metropolitan Police officers from the Organised Crime Partnership searched a flat linked to him in Upminster and discovered another…

Home News One in seven parents have not spoken to their children about online safety Return to News 12 September 2016 Online experts at the NCA are encouraging parents to talk to their children about online safety, as new figures show that 15% have never had a conversation about it with their children at all. The figures come from a recent NCA survey which highlights that many parents do not feel confident talking to their children about online risks and are unsure where to go for help and support. Almost half – 46% - said that although they had discussed it with their children they hadn’t done so recently. From Monday 12 September the NCA CEOP Command’s #Think…

Return to News9 September 2016 A man from Basingstoke who live-streamed child abuse from the Philippines has been given a 13 year sentence. Officers from the NCA’s CEOP Command raided Thomas Sloman’s home in January 2015, seizing a number of computers and electronic devices. Forensic analysis showed they contained around 12,000 indecent images, including more than 2,000 classed as “category A”, indicating the worst forms of abuse. Many of the images were screengrabs taken from live webcam streams. Chat logs also showed that the 43-year-old (right) had been actively soliciting for images online and had arranged to view abuse over the internet. Sloman was charged with …

Return to News9 September 2016 Seven members of an organised crime group were sentenced to 121 years today at Birmingham Crown Court after their attempt to smuggle heroin worth nearly £5million into Britain was ended by the National Crime Agency and Border Force. The conspiracy, led by Andrew Lillis, 47, of Coventry, Mark Regan, 44 and Skinder Ali, 37, both of Birmingham, was discovered when Border Force officers at the Port of Felixstowe searched a shipment from Pakistan in August 2014 and discovered 44kilos of high-purity heroin hidden inside two hydraulic presses weighing 9 tonnes. Officers from the NCA and Border Force worked with engineers over four days to cut op…

Home News Crime group used helicopter to try to evade border detection Return to News 9 September 2016 Three members of an organised crime group who tried to fly £12m worth of class A drugs into the UK have been given prison sentences totalling 52 years. When the group’s rented helicopter flew from Belgium into Redhill Aerodrome in Surrey on Thursday 21 April this year it was being tracked as part of an investigation involving the National Crime Agency, Metropolitan Police, Border Force, and the Dutch and Belgian authorities. The pilot, who was taking flying lessons in the UK and had booked one for later the same day, dropped under radar coverage deliberately and…

Return to News9 September2016 The National Crime Agency has published its third annual public-facing analysis of the serious and organised crime threats affecting the UK. The pdf National Strategic Assessment (NSA) (3.08 MB) draws together knowledge from across the whole law enforcement community. It provides an objective picture of serious and organised crime threats, enabling UK law enforcement as a whole to prioritise, coordinate and target its response. The top five threats for the year ahead, in no order of priority, are identified as organised immigration crime, cyber crime, child sexual exploitation and abuse, firearms, and high end money laundering. Other thre…

Return to News7 September 2016 A Woolwich man who attempted to groom and meet a child for sexual abuse has been sentenced to two years’ imprisonment. Mark Cooper, 35, from Woolwich in south London, believed he was engaging with a 13-year old girl online over a three-month period from November 2015, and made arrangements to meet her. Cooper was arrested by officers from the NCA’s CEOP Command on 9 February 2016 when he travelled to Milton Keynes from London in expectation of the meeting. Officers found that he had booked a room at a local hotel for the two of them. In June 2016, Cooper was charged attempting to meet a child following sexual grooming - and also with …

Return to News3 September 2016 Martin Shannon, 43, from Hythe in Suthampton, has today appeared at court charged with offences relating to:

 sale or transfer of a prohibited weapon contrary to the Firearms Act (SIG pistol)
 sale or transfer of a prohibited weapon contrary to the Firearms Act (CB assault rifle)
 possession of a shortened shotgun contrary to the Firearms Act
 purchase/acquisition of 1400 rounds of ammunition without certificate, contrary to the Firearms Act
 possession of 7 HE grenades contrary to the Explosive Substances Act Shannon, a serving Royal Marine reservist, was arrested in Winnall, Winchester on 1 September following a covert operation led b…