A Carlisle drug addict has been jailed for his role in a huge county lines heroin supply plot which continued to run during tough Covid lockdowns despite key players being arrested and bailed with conditions not to re-enter Cumbria.
High-ranking members of an organised crime gang from the Merseyside area made scores of illegal visits to the city during a 15-month conspiracy to flood streets with the class A drug.
With the help of city street dealers they established a customer base of addicts and sent out more than 4,800 text messages, through burner phone lines, advertising heroin for sale.
They also moved into city addresses, a practice known as cuckooing as illicit activity occurred between March 2020 and May 2021.
Despite police making arrests and imposing bail conditions which banned conspirators from Cumbria, their criminal conduct continued apace until police rounded up a group of suspects.
Phone cell site data, numberplate recognition technology and seizures of both heroin and bulking agents pointed to more than 3.6kg of heroin being trafficked.
Prosecutor Brendan Burke told Carlisle Crown Court today: “The obvious feature in this case is that it was intended the conspiracy continue for as long as it could. It, in fact, persisted in spite of multiple police disruptions until it was finally shut down by accumulating arrests and police pressure.”
Keiron Lowe, 43, became involved when an associate was arrested. Lowe took possession of a burner phone and, when an organised crime group member made contact, he agreed to take on a modest criminal role.
Lowe made one trip to Liverpool, in April 2021, to deliver cash but was beaten up during that illegal errand and then arrested near Shap during the return journey. When later brought to court, Lowe admitted conspiracy to supply heroin.
The court heard his drug addiction first began aged 16; that the first of his 124 criminal offences was clocked up in 1993; and of family members trying in vain to help him.
Judge Michael Fanning concluded that Lowe’s criminal offending occurred during a limited period of around 12 days. He jailed Lowe, of Baird Road, Carlisle, for 31 months, telling him: “You must have had an awareness of the scale of the operation that was going on.”
- Six other people brought to court in connection with the conspiracy are due to be sentenced at the crown court later this week
