Corrupt airport boss behind Colombia cocaine plot jailed alongside Midland couple

Yahoo

18 hours ago

A corrupt airport security manager thought he was helping to smuggle £2million worth of cocaine into the UK - but the illegal haul had been sneakily replaced with blocks of wood.
Junaed Dar arrived at Heathrow Airport three hours before his shift started on December 14, 2019, so he could assist two drugs mules with bringing 22kg of cocaine into the country.
The 47-year-old, of Randolph Road, Slough, wore his security uniform as he collected an airport vehicle and drove to Terminal 2B to meet Michael Williams, 39, and Jessica Waldron, 38.
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The couple, of Buxton Road in Dudley, were due to land on a flight from Bogota, Colombia, and were carrying the class A drugs in their checked-in baggage.
However they were unaware that Columbian police, working with the National Crime Agency, had searched their bags in Bogota Airport and removed the blocks of cocaine and replaced them with blocks of wood.
Dar escorted the couple to the toilets after they had retrieved their bags, took them and got in his vehicle.
He was about to drive away when NCA officers swooped in to arrest him.
Williams and Waldron were arrested by Border Force officers as they tried to leave the airport and were later jailed for six years and eight months each in 2022, having admitted attempting to import class A drugs.
Dar was jailed for 16-and-a-half years at Kingston Crown Court today.
He was sentenced alongside two fellow members of the organised crime group.
Ruford Davis, 55, and David Farquharson, 53, were involved in the organisation of the drug couriers' outward and return journeys.
The pair both sent Waldron identical screenshots from encrypted mobile devices of instructions for meeting Dar when the plane landed.
Davis, of Pitfield Road, Dudley, and Farquharson, of Waterside Avenue, Wednesbury, were both sentenced to 14-and-a-half years.
Dar, Davis and Farquharson were all convicted by a jury of attempting to smuggle class A drugs.
Following the sentencing, Mark Abbott, NCA operations manager, said: 'Dar committed a gross betrayal of trust by playing a crucial role in this conspiracy which started in South America and would have ended with violent street gangs in UK towns and cities.
'Organised crime groups need corrupt insiders like Dar to help move illegal commodities.
"As an airport security manager, he had the access and ability to move drugs so they might not be stopped.
'Heathrow Airport fully supported the operation along with Border Force and together we continue to combat the threat of class A drugs being smuggled this way.'