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UK: Gateway Scotland
Sunday Mail
Sunday 27 Jan 2002 Judge warns international drug gangs are targeting our airports A JUDGE has warned that international drug smugglers are targeting Scottish airports because they see them as an easy touch. Lord Abernethy said Scotland had become a key entry point to Britain for drug mules after a series of High Court trials. Gangs based in Africa, the West Indies, South America, and Pakistan smuggle millions of pounds worth of drugs through Scots airports every year. They believe they stand less chance of being caught at smaller, quieter airports. South African Trevor Sansom, 32, was jailed for three and a half years last week after he was caught with cannabis worth pounds 135,000 at Glasgow airport. He had carried the drugs to Scotland from Johannesburg, via Amsterdam, after being threatened by Nigerian drug dealers. Before sentencing Sansom, Lord Abernethy revealed there had been a series of South African couriers convicted of bringing drugs into Scotland. He said: "This is the fourth case that has come before me where the pattern has been the same." There have been 19 drugs seizures from couriers travelling from South Africa in the last two years - at Edinburgh or Glasgow airports. Sansom is the 13th courier to be jailed in that time. He admitted smuggling charges at the High Court in Glasgow on Thursday, but claimed his wife and children would have been killed by the Nigerians if he had not agreed to bring the drugs to Scotland. Defence advocate Brian McConnachie said: "These drug dealers pick on people who are down on their luck and befriend them, before forcing them with threats into doing their bidding." The South African drug mules fly first to Amsterdam, Zurich, Paris or Brussels - then on to Scotland. The drugs are collected at the airport and taken to either Liverpool or London for distribution throughout the UK and Ireland. Customs spokesman Ron Barrie said: "Many think that airports such as Edinburgh will be quieter and there is more chance of drugs passing through unnoticed. "Plus there is a growing number of connections from Scotland to European cities. "Drugs are a major problem in Western Europe and Scotland is now an obvious route into Europe. "The gangs also believe there is less chance of their deliveries being discovered by using people with no criminal backgrounds." In the last two years, customs teams in Scotland have broken up countless international smuggling rings. But they have no way of knowing how many consignments got through. Recently, two men from England were stopped with a pounds 1million haul of cocaine at Glasgow airport, smuggled in from Central America via the United States. And four women who travelled from Johannesburg to Edinburgh via Amsterdam were sentenced to a total of six years for smuggling almost 60kgs of cannabis. Customs officers at Glasgow airport also seized cocaine worth pounds 1.7million from a Guatemala flight and pounds 600,000 of cocaine from a Peru flight, though both couriers were later acquitted. Ghanian Frank O'Hene was jailed for seven years after he was caught with cocaine worth pounds 1million at Glasgow airport. And Jamaican student Nadine Coburn, 21, was recently caged for four years for smuggling pounds 78,000 worth of cocaine at Glasgow airport.
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