CROOKS who smuggled illegal drugs worth up to £7billion from the Continent over two years have been jailed.
It is believed to be the largest narcotics operation ever detected in the UK.
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Ringleader Paul Green, 59, known as The Big Fella, was the point of contact for gangs, who paid a fee to ship heroin, cocaine, amphetamines and cannabis.
He and his conspirators set up front companies in the North of England and the Netherlands using false and stolen identities.
They hid the drugs in shipments of onions, garlic and ginger. Green, of Widnes, Cheshire, was caught after cops cracked his encrypted phone.
At Manchester crown court he was convicted of conspiracy to import drugs and got 32 years.
His “right-hand man”, Steven Martin, 53, of Bolton, got 28 years, and Muhammad Ovais, 46, of Burnage, got 27 years.
Richard Harrison, NCA regional head of investigations, said: “This was an extremely high-harm OCG that used every tactic possible to evade detection and cheat justice.
“The offenders smuggled huge quantities of drugs into the UK. They had absolutely no ethics. They stooped incredibly low and left a trail of devastation for entirely innocent people by cloning businesses and stealing identities.
“NCA officers and Dutch partners were tenacious and left no stone unturned in this investigation.”
Prosecutor Andrew Thomas KC told jurors: “As soon as one company became exposed, they would switch to another one.”
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