No verdict on drugs charges
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by Lee Kimber
• Customs and Excise have dropped a drugs prosecution against Coalville-based driver Ken McKay two years after he was arrested.
McKay and his brother Brian were first put on trial four weeks ago. The jury was unable to reach a verdict on Ken but acquitted Brian McKay on a charge of importing 90kg of cannabis resin.
The two were stopped by Portsmouth customs after bringing a vegetable load back from Spain. They were almost certainly victims of a drugs ring that used drivers as decoys to distract customs officers from far bigger drugs loads carried on trucks behind them (CM 8-14 February).
"It's not sunk in yet," says Gareth Beynon, the solicitor who defended McKay. "Ken has been punished enough."
Beynon says the next step is that to get the case "listed"—the legal term for official withdrawal of the charges.
The decision is the latest twist in a dismal period for dri
vers accused of drugs smuggling. In the past 18 months solicitors, drivers rights groups and others have passed a mountain of evidence to Customs officers suggesting that the drivers were set up. But Customs continued to give evidence against drivers up until the McKay case four weeks ago.
Two weeks ago a senior Customs intelligence official admitted some drivers might have been innocent but said it was for the courts to decide. Meanwhile, drivers such as Chris Griffin continue to protest their innoChris Griffin: Still cence from fighting to prove jail, his innocence.