National Crime Agency (NCA)

Home News ‘Small but often’ crime group smuggled drugs through the post Return to News 17 December 2015 Two members of a crime group who smuggled more than 70 small parcels of class A and B drugs into the UK in the post have been given prison sentences totalling over 20 years. Nigerian national Patrick Udensi (above left), 34, from Enfield in London and John Arinze Nwosu (above right), 42, from Edgbaston, Birmingham were arrested by National Crime Agency officers in January and November 2014 after Border Force staff at the Heathrow Worldwide Distribution Centre discovered a parcel containing cocaine. The package had been mailed from St Maarten in the Caribbean …

Home News Teenager admitted trying to buy gun on the dark web Return to News 22 December 2015 A teenager from Cardiff has been given a 12 month sentence in a young offenders’ institution after he attempted to buy a handgun on the dark web. The 17-year-old, who can’t be named for legal reasons, admitted attempting to import a handgun during a hearing at Cardiff Youth Court on 26 November. The court heard he had tried to buy the Glock weapon from an illegal arms dealer in the United States. When NCA investigators, assisted by specialist cyber crime officers from Tarian, the Southern Wales Regional Organised Crime Unit, raided his house in Cardiff they also found …

Return to News21 December 2015 British men are being urged to take extra care over the festive period, as preliminary findings from an ongoing study show that they are most likely to go missing on a night out - often with a fatal outcome - between the months of December and February. The ‘Men Missing on a Night Out’ study is a collaboration between the Department of Geography and Geology at Kingston University and the National Crime Agency’s UK Missing Persons Bureau (UKMPB). So far, 97 cases have been identified where men were found dead after going missing on a night out in the UK, between January 2010 and August 2015. The winter months of December, January and Febru…

Home News Joint operation snares fugitive heroin smuggler Return to News 18 December 2015 A 38 year-old man, who went on the run in 2013 when his criminal partner was arrested for importing heroin, has been sentenced to 20 years in prison after an investigation by the joint National Crime Agency and Metropolitan Police Service Organised Crime Partnership (OCP). Sebahattin Aydin, a Turkish national living in Teesside, had been the passenger in a car involved in a 20kg heroin seizure but fled before he could be arrested. He was identified by Metropolitan Police officers from fingerprints on the heroin packages. The driver of the car, Murat Gungor, from Chingfrod, is …

Return to News 17 December 2015 A specialist money launderer, who processed £100 million of criminal profits, has been ordered by the court to hand over £5.4million. Ussama El Kurd, 67, formerly of Lynwood Road, London, was sentenced to 9 years in February 2013 for conspiracy to commit money laundering. Between October 2006 and July 2010 the money service business he operated, Kensington Money Exchange, received Euro currency, from a number of foreign exchange wholesalers, to a combined value in excess of £197,000,000.00. However legitimate trades, provided by off the street tourist trade, business trade or online business, accounted for only a small fraction of these …

Home News Drug trafficker who claimed to be policeman used luxury car to smuggle £8m cocaine Return to News 16 December 2015 An Albanian man who claimed to be a former policeman running a security firm that provided bodyguards to celebrities has been jailed for 18 years for smuggling 60 kilos of cocaine in a specially adapted car. Arjan Pasha (right), aged 40, from Biscot Road, Luton, told NCA investigators that he was a former Albanian policeman and had been in Brussels on business for his company. He was stopped by Border Force officers at the Coquelles Channel Tunnel terminal in April 2014. A search of his Mercedes SUV revealed special compartments had been en…

Home News NCA Human Trafficking Report reveals 21% rise in potential victims Return to News 16 December 2015 The National Crime Agency has today published the Strategic Assessment of the Nature and Scale of Human Trafficking in 2014, the fourth annual report on potential victims of trafficking. The NCA’s UK Human Trafficking Centre (UKHTC) reports that 3,309 people, including 732 children, were potential victims of trafficking for exploitation in 2014, an increase of 21 per cent on 2013. The report shows that for the fourth consecutive year, Romania was the most prevalent country of origin of potential victims of trafficking, although in this reporting period, vi…

Home News Direct from Colombia: 2.4 tonnes of cocaine seized in the English Channel Return to News 14 December 2015 A joint operation involving UK and French law enforcement has resulted in the seizure of around 2.4 tonnes of cocaine from a freighter a few miles off the UK’s south coast. Acting on intelligence from the National Crime Agency and the French Customs investigation service DNRED, the Moldovan flagged MV Carib Palm was intercepted in the Eastern Channel on Thursday 10 December. It had sailed from Colombia and was on its way to Gdansk in Poland. The interception, led by French Customs and supported by Border Force and the Royal Navy patrol vessel HMS S…

Home News Industrial drug lab and 1.5 tonnes of cocaine uncovered in Spain Return to News 11 December 2015 An international multi-agency operation has led to 11 arrests, the seizure of 1.5 tonnes of cocaine and the shut down of an industrial-sized drug production lab. Acting on intelligence from the National Crime Agency, officers from the Spanish National Police searched a shipping container from Colombia which arrived in the Port of Valencia on 30 November. The container appeared to be loaded with sacks of charcoal on wooden pallets but forensic examination found that the pallets were made of compressed cocaine powder made to look like wood, and some of the sac…

Return to News11 December 2015 A Polish lorry driver delivering an HGV full of Gouda cheese now faces 20 years in prison after an National Crime Agency investigation linked him to the importation of cocaine and heroin through Harwich. Dominik Kregiel, aged 40, was en route to Cheshire with his cargo of Gouda and heroin when officers from Border Force and the NCA stopped him at the Port of Harwich in June 2015. The vehicle was scanned and searched with officers finding 50 kilos of heroin, with an estimated street value of £6,732,000, hidden in the sleeping area of the cab and above the passenger seat. Kregiel was arrested and interviewed, where he denied knowing anythi…

Home News International cyber crime exercise tests multi-agency response Return to News 11 December 2015 Cyber crime specialists from across Europe have converged on the UK to take part in a ground-breaking exercise to test the international response to serious cyber crime. Exercise Silver Shadow, a multinational exercise run by the NCA’s National Cyber Crime Unit (NCCU), funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and supported by the Home Office, saw officers from eight different countries come together to assess their collective response to a simulated cyber attack on a fictitious international petroleum company. The aim was to test how investigators and pro…

Return to News11 December 2015 Three men have been sentenced to 39 years in prison after conspiring to supply over £6 million of cocaine. Geoff Donovan, aged 76, from Coulsdon, Croydon, and Ashley Devaney, aged 58, from Chislehurst, Kent, were arrested by officers from the Organised Crime Partnership in June 2015. Officers observed the transfer of a package from Devaney to Donovan, which had previously been retrieved from a house on Imperial Way, Chislehurst, by Devaney. As Donovan drove away in his car, he was stopped and was seen attempting to stash the package under the driver’s footwell. It was later confirmed as being one kilo of cocaine. A search of the unoccup…

Home News Launderer used money service bureau to move £10m criminal cash Return to News 10 December 2015 A man who laundered more than £10 million in criminal cash from a money service bureau in East London has been jailed. Umer Rasheed, 34, of Skeffington Road, East Ham, used his position as manager of Usman International Ltd in Green Street, Upton Park, to send hundreds of payments to Pakistan over a period of almost four years. He was arrested in December 2011 following a handover with cash courier Shokeer Hussain, 46, of Lansdowne Road, Walthamstow. Investigators moved in after witnessing Hussain hand Rasheed a Tesco carrier bag which was found to contain £50…

Return to News10 December 2015 Greater levels of coordinated proactive working between police forces and the NCA has identified nearly 700 potential online child abuse image offenders in recent months. Publishing figures today on operational progress by the NCA and 40 police forces, NCA-CEOP Director Johnny Gwynne and Chief Constable Simon Bailey, NPCC Lead for Child Protection, said the results had been achieved through a combination of more consistent prioritising, increased investment in capability, and the mainstreaming of a coordinated and proactive national approach. The activity has led to the arrests of over 680 people on suspicion of accessing indecent images …