Coach's picture driven around tourist hotspot after what he did in nursing home

Daily Mirror

2 days ago

Mark Quinn became a wanted fugitive after he built a major amphetamine drug ring in a Merseyside nursing home and was ultimately tracked down to a location in the Netherlands
A former boxing coach had his picture driven around Spain's Costa del Sol after he used a nursing home for he heart of his trafficking ring.
Mark Quinn fled the UK in 2014 after he became wanted over using the empty nursing home for an amphetamine trafficking ring. The "most wanted fugitive" was wanted after police carried out raids in Scotland and Merseyside, crushing the drugs ring.
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His picture was then driven around Costa del Sol on the side of a van as part of a major National Crime Agency (NCA) campaign, which aimed to catch people abroad. But he was not apprehended until 2021 following a joint operation by the NCA, Police Scotland as well as Dutch counterparts who tracked him down to Maastricht in the Netherlands.
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Quinn was later extradited to Scotland and appeared at Edinburgh's high court where he admitted to trafficking amphetamines. His downfall began during a search of Alder Grange nursing home in West Derby, Liverpool, that he used to prepare the majority of the drugs for further supply.
Quinn, from Stockbridge Village, in Knowsley, Merseyside, was a respected among amateur and professional boxers and worked with a number of prodigies in the city and trained big name fighters at some of Liverpool's top clubs.
He also attended a number of high profile media events before big fights and was in the corner on some of the city's biggest boxing nights at the ECHO arena in 2011. He was also friendly with a number of major football players who he crossed paths with during his time as a boxing coach.
In 2013, he became wanted following a Police Scotland surveillance probe. In August that year, police watched as drugs were handed over in Lanarkshire before they searched a flat in Paisley, Renfrewshire, where the load was taken for storage.
There officers recovered 112kg of class B drugs worth upward of £3million and later discovered Quinn's fingerprints on the packaging. Officers later saw in February the following year a Ford Transit van being driven from Scotland to Liverpool.
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Quinn was later seen driving the van into the Alder Grange nursing home, where Everton legend Dixie Dean once lived, and he was spotted loading items into the back of the vehicle. The van ended up being stopped northbound on the M74 and was taken to Motherwell police station where it was found to be transporting 100kg of amphetamine worth some £2.4m on the streets.
Quinn was seen at a a car auction business in Edinburgh before he travelled to Stepps, North Lanarkshire, with others the following month. He later met with a Scotsman in Liverpool and following a visit to the nursing home the accomplice was later stopped driving north.
Quinn was later found to have 100kg of amphetamine worth some 3.2million. Merseyside Police later searched the nursing home with mixing paddles, gloves, basins, and face masks being found alongside barrels of methanol and sulphuric acid which are used to make amphetamine past, the LiverpoolEcho reported.
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When he returned to Paisley Sheriff Court for sentencing in September 2022, advocate depute David McLean said the amphetamine production line at the nursing home showed a "level of sophistication rarely encountered, and is representative of an established organised criminal network, which operates at the upper levels of drug supply and trafficking."
Defence counsel Gail Gianni said there had been a project to turn the nursing home into luxury flats but that it ended up running into financial difficulties.
She said: "Mr Quinn would have carried out all the building work and he would have made a substantial sum of money from that project." She said he ran into financial problems and asked "certain people" for a loan of money. She said: "Once he had done that he was easy prey for them."
Quinn was ultimately jailed for seven years, procurator for specialist casework Laura Buchan said he "played a significant role in an organised criminal network involved in the international supply and trafficking of drugs."