Members of huge drugs ring based in Ellesmere Port jailed for total of 73 years

MEMBERS of a cocaine ring that pumped thousands of pounds worth of drugs into Ellesmere Port have been jailed for a total of 73 years.

A two-year police operation ended when the last of  20 people were convicted of drug offences  and handed sentences  from six months to nine years at Chester Crown Court last week.

The gang  orchestrated the large-scale supply of cocaine to crime groups across the North West in areas including Ellesmere Port, Merseyside, North Wales, West Mercia, Manchester and Cumbria.

In May this year two of the gang’s most prolific offenders were jailed for their part in supplying cocaine and overseeing the setting up of a cannabis farm in North Wales.

Andrew Knox, 40, of Camden Road, Ellesmere Port, and Lee Jones, 32, of Spunhill Avenue, Ellesmere Port, both received sentences of eight years, eight months, while Carl Sinclair Mattison, 38, of Swale Road,  Ellesmere Port, was sentenced to six years, eight months for his part in supplying the cocaine.

The court heard Knox and Mattison would meet clients to do business in a variety of locations in 2011, from the Yeoman pub in Little Sutton to the BP service station at the Chester Posthouse roundabout, the KFC in Ellesmere Port, the car park of Simon’s Cafe and the Blue Planet Aquarium, where three cocaine transactions were made.

The massive investigation, dubbed Operation Barometer, was launched in 2010 by Cheshire police’s Crime Operations Unit, taking up hours of intelligence gathering.

But it wasn’t until October 2011 that arrests were made in  a series of dawn raids.

One of these was Simon Howard, 44, of Woolton Court, Ellesmere Port, who was staying at Aire Close when police smashed down the door.

Howard was also charged with affray after he allegedly brandished a 10in knife at a police officer.

He was jailed for nine years last week by Judge David Hale, who told him he ‘must accept a substantial penalty’ for his actions which he committed ‘for no other reason than profit’.

Richard Parrott, 72, of Camden Road, Ellesmere Port, and Susan Thomas, 34, of Oliver Lane, Great Sutton, were found not guilty of all charges, which they had both previously denied.