AT THE HEART OF THE ROAD TRANSPORT INDUSTRY.

Call our Sales Team on 0208 912 2120

Drug smuggler driver jailed

9th August 1990, Page 19
9th August 1990
Page 19
Page 19, 9th August 1990 — Drug smuggler driver jailed
Close
Noticed an error?
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.

Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

• Marypurt owner-driver Carl Gainford has been jailed for eight years after admitting smuggling £1.5m worth of cannabis.

At Beverley Crown Court, judge Alan Simpson said that the case provided a message to all lorry drivers not to resort to drug smuggling to make money.

Margaret Bickford-Smith, prosecuting, said that Gainford and an accomplice, Roy Brooke, of Eccles, Manchester, had travelled to Belgium to strike a deal with dealers and hide the drugs in Gainford's artic. The drugs were discovered when Customs officers at Hull Docks carried out a routine search of the vehicle. They found 344kg of cannabis resin in the semi-trailer behind the bulkhead, and another 49.98kg of the drug underneath the bunk in the tractor.

For Gainford, Geoffrey Marson said he had received a number of threats to both himself and his family so that he would keep quiet about the other people involved.

Judge Simpson said that Gainford had clearly played a subordinate role. Ile warned lorry drivers not to regard drug running as a way out of financial difficulties, saying that any driver who accepted such an offer made two things certain: one was that he would be caught, and the other was that he would face a long prison sentence. Brooke, who had pleaded not guilty, was found guilty and was sentenced to nine years' imprisonment.