Some load of frozen chips!
- 22 February 2010 16:1141176UK Border Agency information...
LORRY DRIVER CHARGED WITH DRUG SMUGGLING
UK Border Agency officers in Dover have charged a man from Northern Ireland with drug smuggling.
Nigel DONNOLLY, 42, of Cookstown, County Tyrone has been remanded in custody until he next appears at Dover Magistrates Court on 25 February.
Mr Donnelly was arrested following an incident on 17 February at the inward freight controls at Dover's Eastern Docks. UK Border Agency officers searched a lorry and trailer and uncovered approximately 350 kilos of cannabis with an estimated street value of £900,400 in a load of frozen chips.
Enquiries by UK Border Agency investigators are continuing.
Malcolm Bragg, Assistant Director of Criminal and Financial Investigations for the UK Border Agency, said:
"UK Border Agency officers work tirelessly 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to detect and prevent drugs from being smuggled into the UK. We are determined to prevent this terrible trade which can have such a destructive impact on the lives of so many.
"Anyone with information about activity they suspect may be linked to drug smuggling should call the Customs Hotline on 0800 59 5000."email: dover7@msn.com - 22 February 2010 16:1641177Clearly the UK Border Agency have been doing a very effective job with this latest win situation. Well done to them for keeping all those drugs off our streets.
Just another little bit about the UK Border Agency...
"The UK Border Agency was launched on 3 April 2008 by the Home Office, establishing a single force to protect our borders, control migration for the benefit of the country, prevent border tax fraud, smuggling and immigration crime and make quick and fair decisions on asylum claims."
Thats a tall remit for any group, but since launch they have made some seriously good arrests and stopped vast quantities of everything from cigarettes to the inevitable drugs.
If I remember correctly I was there at the docks the day it was launched. A visit from Government Minister Liam Byrne accompanied by MP Gwyn Prosser kicked the new service off.email: dover7@msn.com - 22 February 2010 17:5541178Well Done to the UK Border Agency they are doing a great job keeping these drugs off our streets
With the latest coup it puts a completely different meaning to 'Would you like fries with that, Sir?'
- 22 February 2010 18:4941183So more good news from the UK Border Agency, the bastard child of the forced marriage of H M Immigration Service and H M Customs and Excise, and despised by both parents.
There are more than enough drugs for all still on the street and the price makes them almost as cheap as the chips in the van above, see here:-
http://www.idmu.co.uk/prices.htm
As to their brief to control immigration for the benefit of the country, don't make me laugh!
Net immigration quadrupled to 237,000 a year between 1997 and 2007. In 2008 it was 163,000. 3million immigrants have arrived since 1997.
A migrant still arrives every minute.
We must build a new home every six minutes for new migrants.
England is already, with Holland, the most crowded country in Europe
(except Malta)
Immigration will add 7 million to the population of England in the next 24 years - that is 7 times the population of Birmingham.
On the positive side he U K Border Agency does however have an excellent P R Department.
- 22 February 2010 20:1841188Hmm, considering the very real obesity problem in this country maybe they should have impounded the chips!
- 22 February 2010 21:3941204They were probably exported from UK as potatoes Sid, so they're only coming back home after processing.
Well done the UKBA for intercepting this consignment of cannabis.Phil West
If at first you don't succeed, use a BIGGER hammer!! - 23 February 2010 16:2441243Another one today...so the guys are certainly catching the smugglers anyway...the UK Border Agency remit is rather impossible all round, but as for the smuggling end of things, well they seem to be effective
...read on..
WOMAN CHARGED WITH DRUG SMUGGLING
UK Border Agency officers in Dover have charged a woman from Germany with drug smuggling.
Simone PLATE, 41 of Hagen in Germany has been remanded in custody after appearing in Folkestone Magistrates Court yesterday, 22 February. She will next appear at Dover Magistrates Court on 25 February 2010.
Ms Plate was arrested following an incident on the 20 February at the Channel Tunnel entrance in Coquelles, France. UK Border Agency officers searched a German registered hire vehicle and found three and a half kilos of cocaine, with an estimated street value of £140,000, concealed in the rear wheel arches.
Enquiries by UK Border Agency investigators are continuing.
Tom Dowdall, Director of European Operations for the UK Border Agency, said:
"UK Border Agency officers work tirelessly 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to detect and prevent drugs from being smuggled into the UK. We are determined to prevent this terrible trade which can have such a destructive impact on the lives of so many.
"Anyone with information about activity they suspect maybe linked to drug smuggling should contact the Customs Hotline on 0800 59 5000."
The new UK Border Agency brings together officers equipped with immigration and customs powers into a single force securing the UK border.email: dover7@msn.com - 24 February 2010 11:4341274the amount of illegal drugs available for sale increases on a yearly basis.
there is only so much the border authorities can do.
bob is right about the PR dept, they do make things look good, but as the prices are coming down on the street, the evidence is that more is available than ever before. - 24 February 2010 12:4041275More effort should be put into legalising and taxing some of these drugs.
- 24 February 2010 13:3441282Not for me legalising drugs, I am not in agreement with that in anyway.
- 24 February 2010 14:0041284Vic, the Chemist is full of if legalised drugs, but it seems those that might give pleasure are not to be allowed. What is the point in banning/criminalising something whose usage that clearly cannot be addressed in such a way?
One might also add tobacco and alcohol to the list of legalised drugs, so let's not be namby pamby about this and address the matter as adults with an open mind. - 24 February 2010 15:4341287Sid, whilst I agree with you about tobacco and alcohol, I hope your tongue was firmly planted in your cheek over the legalising of recreational drugs. I guess I'm extremely old-fashioned when I say that I find it obscene that so much money can be wasted on smoking, injecting or snorting mind-altering drugs when so many in the world are starving or abused; people with money to burn (literally!) in such a manner need to examine their priorities in life (imho!).True friends stab you in the front.
- 24 February 2010 17:0541290legalising drugs will take away the livelihoods of our most unpleasant criminals,
it will also ensure that users do not purchase tainted stuff that can kill them.
the tax take will raise prices therefore stopping a lot of new and small recreational users buying the stuff. - 24 February 2010 20:0541305With Howard and Sid on this one.
If you look at history homo sapiens has been getting out of his head on various substances almost from year one (as do various animals especially on fermented fruit i.e. alcohol).
Alcohol and nicotine, both legal in this country, are causing more problems financially and socially than any illegal drugs are.
Whilst I would not advise anyone under the age of C.21 to take any drugs (their brains are still forming and certainly with cannabis there does seem to be a correlation between teenage cannabis use and schizophrenia) with all conscience I could not say the same to any adult.
Whilst not my drug of choice cannabis does not get people into fights on a Friday night in my town centre.
Many jazz musicians have been heroin addicts for years. It will not kill you. It makes life a little cotton woolly. What will kill is doses of unknown concentration.
Steve Jobs (Apple) still looks back on an LSD trip as one of the best things he has ever done in his life.
As it is with our 'war' on drugs we are merely financing gangs in the UK and terrorism abroad (both South America and the Middle East).
We need to grow up.