LONDON: Two Indian-origin men have been sentenced to prison in the UK for smuggling cocaine, cannabis and cigarettes into the country hidden in shipments of perishable goods.
Anand Tripathi (61) and Varun Bhardwaj (39) were both sentenced to 19 years and 15 years in jail, respectively, after they were convicted in November, following a 71-day trial at Isleworth Crown Court, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said.
They were also sentenced for not paying 9,774,220 pounds in import duties and VAT on 18.6 million cigarettes they smuggled on three dates, separate from the drug imports.
The court heard that in total the men imported 272.86 kg of cocaine and 2,503.36 kg of cannabis across four shipments between September 2021 and November 2022.
One shipment contained just over two tonnes of cannabis hidden amongst yams from Ghana.
Another containing 49 kg of cocaine was concealed with oranges from South Africa.
The drugs had an estimated street value of 28.9 million pounds but were all seized before they could be sold on and later destroyed by police.
“These two men played vital roles in trying to flood UK streets with huge quantities of illegal drugs. The cost and damage to lives that drugs cause in our society is incalculable," Richard Partridge from the CPS said.
"This conspiracy was only made possible by Anand Tripathi’s experience in importation and customs clearance, and Varun Bhardwaj’s willingness to assume day to day management of their operation."
Partridge added that there were others involved in the scheme who haven’t yet been identified.
The scheme involved the pair using their freight company as a cover to clear shipping containers that held drugs and cigarettes and diverting them from their intended destination to a warehouse they controlled.
There they would be offloaded by organised crime groups, according to the CPS.
It was exposed when they failed to divert one container which instead went to a farm in Somerset in April 2022.
The farmer found plastic covered blocks of cocaine with a street value of 15 million pounds hidden amongst animal feed from Colombia.
The three consignments of smuggled cigarettes came hidden alongside Bombay mix snacks from Mumbai, coconut fibre used to manufacture doormats from Sri Lanka, and biscuits from Chennai.
The drugs and cigarettes were seized on different dates at ports including Portsmouth, Felixstowe and London Gateway.
When police searched Bhardwaj’s home in Hounslow, west London, they found a 1 kg packet of cannabis in a cupboard under the stairs valued at 10,000 pounds.
He claimed it had fallen out of a shipment while it was being unloaded and he was keeping it as evidence.
He did not know what it contained and was going to inform the police but never did.
Bhardwaj also refused to disclose the PIN number to one of his mobile phones.
Tripathi was convicted of three counts -- importing cocaine, importing cannabis, and evading duty payable on cigarettes.
Bhardwaj was convicted of the same counts as Tripathi but received a slightly different sentence of 19 years. He was also sentenced on two further counts -- possession of cannabis (one year), and failing to disclose a PIN number to a mobile phone (one year).