Coventry cocaine and cannabis drug dealers jailed after judge rejects claims - The Coventry Observer

Coventry cocaine and cannabis drug dealers jailed after judge rejects claims

Coventry Editorial 9th Mar, 2020   0

A JUDGE has rejected a Coventry man’s claims that drugs found in two cars registered to him outside his home were just being stored for a dealer to whom he owed money.

And Shahidul Islam was jailed for five years and five months after Judge Anthony Potter concluded that he was acting as ‘an organiser, selling drugs for money.’

Islam (28) of Croydon Close, Cheylesmore, Coventry, had pleaded guilty at Warwick Crown Court to possessing cocaine and cannabis with intent to supply them.

With him in the dock was Amandeep Kang (25) of Alder Road, Longford, Coventry, who was jailed for 15 months after he admitted possessing cannabis with intent to supply it.




Prosecutor Jamie Scott said that in June 2017 a car being driven by Kang, with Islam in the front passenger seat, was stopped by the police because Kang was disqualified at the time.

There was an obvious smell of cannabis, so the officers searched the car – and in a compartment under the driver’s seat they found 12 bags of skunk cannabis worth £120.


Kang said the cannabis was his, and that Islam had nothing to do with it, but both men were arrested – and their phones had messages on them indicating the supply of drugs.

As well as messages relating to the supply of cannabis and cocaine, Islam’s phone showed he had sent instructions to someone else to weigh out and prepare wraps of the drugs.

“Both their homes were searched, and Khan’s home only produced a tin of empty dealer bags in his bedroom. But at Islam’s home a significant quantity of drugs was discovered and bundles of cash amounting to £7,675,” said Mr Scott.

In the boot of an Audi outside the house was a large bag of skunk cannabis, while a second bag contained dealer bags, a set of scales and a package of 34 grams of cocaine with Islam’s fingerprints on it.

The Audi was registered to Islam, as was a VW in which officers found two further large bags of cannabis and a box with 27.7 grams of cocaine in it.

Mr Scott said that in total at Islam’s home, the police seized 1.8 kilos of skunk with a wholesale value of up to £9,600 and 61.7 grams of cocaine with a wholesale value of £2,500.

At first Islam denied having anything to do with either car, but then back-tracked although he maintained he was unaware of the drugs in either car.

He entered his plea on the basis that he had built up a substantial debt to a dealer who, to settle the debt, had given him the money to buy the two cars and register them in his name.

Islam said he knew the dealer was storing drugs in the cars, and claimed in court that he only co-operated because of the risk of ‘serious injury or death’ if he refused.

He said that last year the police gave him a warning that his life was at risk from the dealer, claiming: “They were his drugs in the car, so he probably wants the money for them.”

Questioned by Mr Scott, Islam denied he would supply the drugs to anyone other than retrieving them to hand back to the dealer as and when he was told to do so.

Islam said that £5,000 of the cash was savings for his wedding, and of the messages found on the phone, he claimed: “There were two phones found in the car. The Nokia wasn’t mine.”

Mr Scott suggested that documents with his name and address on which were found in one of the cars indicated that it was his, but he said he must have left them there by accident.

Rejecting Islam’s basis of plea, Judge Anthony Potter said: “He has asserted his only involvement was to hold the drugs. I reject his account. It doesn’t fit with the evidence.

“I am quite satisfied [the messages on] the Nokia phone properly reflect his involvement in the drugs trade, and that he was directly involved in the supply of drugs and instructing others in the supply of them.”

William Chipperfield, for Islam, said that at the time he was addicted to class A drugs, but has since turned his life around and ‘is making real efforts to be a better person.’

Rajinder Gill, for Kang, who had a previous conviction for producing cannabis and a caution for possessing it with intent to supply, said he had ‘moved away from a criminal lifestyle.’

Asking the judge to pass a suspended sentence, he added that Kang had enrolled at college to do a diploma in surveying in the hope of taking over his quantity surveyor father’s business.

Jailing both men, Judge Potter told Islam: “I am quite content you were involved as an organiser, selling drugs for money, although I accept there were other people above you.”

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