Crime gang with 'secret Scots lab' who trafficked truckloads of drugs across border sentenced

dailyrecord.co.uk:

A drug gang member from Scotland has been handed an 18-month sentence after being caught in a National Crime Agency sting that brought down a £1.1million cross-country drugs factory.Stephen King, 49, of Dumbarton, was snared as a lackey in a drugs ring headed up by so-called 'kingpin' Terence Earle.

The group trafficked truckloads of heroin and cocaine between Merseyside and Scotland, and was geared up to produce methamphetamine on an "industrial scale" at a secret lab in Motherwell.But the operation unravelled after King was caught meeting with co-conspirator Stanley Feerick in November 2020 during NCA sting Operation Joyfully.

Shortly after the meeting, Feerick was arrested driving a lorry that contained a holdall packed with heroin worth £300,000 and £20,000 in cash.In December 2020, police used spike strips to stop a lorry carrying 560kg of alpha-phenylacetoacetamide (APAA), a chemical used to make amphetamine, after it had been loaded up at a warehouse near Blackpool.

If it had made its way to Scotland, cops estimate it could have produced 1,000kg of the drug, worth £1.1million.Investigations revealed that the gang – leader Earle, King, Feerick, Lee Baxter and Stephen Singleton – co-ordinated their activities using EncroChat, an encrypted messaging app that was meant to hide communications from prying eyes.