A pair of would-be gangsters who fancied themselves the next Kray twins were jailed for over 25 years after police found a stash of drugs in a garden shed.
Essex-based drug barons Robert Smith, 37, and Ismet Salih, 33, have dismantled their empire in a joint operation by the National Crime Agency and the Met Police.
The pair of kingpins had been using the EncroChat encrypted messaging platform to run their drug dealing operation, making more than £1.25m in profits from selling cocaine and cannabis in areas around Essex.
Labeling themselves the ‘Chadwell Cartel’, a reference to where they sold narcotics, the pair aspired to be like East End mobsters Ronnie and Reggie Kray, whose organized crime gang terrorized London in the late 1950s. and 60.
But their dreams were crushed when investigators arrested them in September 2021 after three kilos of cannabis, worth £15,760, were found in Salih’s garden shed and evidence of a previous cannabis factory was discovered in his loft.
Essex-based drug barons Robert Smith (left), 37, and Ismet Salih (right), 33, have dismantled their empire in a joint operation by the National Crime Agency and the Metropolitan Police. They both aspired to be like the notorious Kray twins.
The pair had supplied cocaine and cannabis to the Chadwell St Mary and Grays areas of Essex, making a £1.25m profit (pictured is some of the narcotics seized by police)
Smith was also discovered with £7,635 in cash in a plastic bag in his shorts at the time of his arrest.
They were subsequently charged with drug offenses and money laundering, which they admitted at Basildon Crown Court in Essex.
But this was the beginning of the end for the couple, as investigators further linked the pair to the seizure of 123 kilos of cocaine and the laundering of proceeds of more than £1.25 million in cash.
They discovered that Smith had headed an organized crime group supplying cocaine and cannabis to the Chadwell St Mary and Grays areas of Essex and was using Salih and another associate, Lee Twigg, as his trusted seconds in command.
Smith used the handle ‘demonfern’ to obtain the cocaine from a Dubai-based seller on EncroChat, calling himself ‘blacknarco’ and ‘darkestnarco’.
Salih and Twigg collected the cocaine from Smiths’ UK suppliers and then stored and distributed the drugs for him. They also made sure that the cash from the sale of the drugs reached the suppliers.
Smith and Salih exchanged more than 6,000 messages on EncroChat, mostly about selling cocaine. Some of these contained ledgers relating to profits made from customers and money paid to their supplier for future stock.
At a hearing at Basildon Crown Court on Wednesday, Smith was jailed for 16 years and six months, and Salih received a nine-year prison sentence.
Police discovered that Smith had headed an organized crime group that supplied cocaine and cannabis to the Chadwell St Mary and Grays areas of Essex and was using Salih and another associate, Lee Twigg (pictured), as his seconds in command trusted.
Smith used the handle ‘demonfern’ to obtain the cocaine from a Dubai-based seller on EncroChat, calling himself ‘blacknarco’ and ‘darkestnarco’. In the photo, blocks of drugs that were seized by the police.
The pair of Essex drug dealers who used the EncroChat encrypted messaging platform to run their criminal enterprise. In the image, some of the items seized by the police.
Smith and Salih were also linked to the seizure of a further 123 kilos of cocaine and had laundered proceeds of more than £1.25m in cash (pictured)
Andrew Tickner, of the Organized Crime Partnership who led the investigation, said: “Robert Smith and Ismet Salih were behind a criminal network selling large quantities of cocaine in Essex and beyond.”
“Their dream of becoming gangsters like the Kray twins was quickly shattered by our investigation. Instead, the reality of it is long prison sentences.’
Investigators established that several other men, including Andrew Fraser and Christopher Low, from Essex, Jamie Sheaves, from Kent, and Adil Bakali, from Wiltshire, were candidates for Smith’s supplier. They had previously been imprisoned for a total of 39 years.
In October 2020, Fraser was arrested while driving a van at the M25 Dartford Crossing in Kent. In the back were found two bags containing 20 kilos of cocaine with a street value of £1.6m, which he would have given to Salih had he not been arrested.
The following month, OCP officers saw Twigg put a black holdall in Bakali’s car, which was later stopped by police at M1 Northampton Services. More than 21 kilos of cocaine with a street value of almost £1.7 million were found in bags in the back of the car.
Christopher Low (left) and Adil Bakali (right) from Essex were couriers for Smith’s supplies
In October 2020, Andrew Fraser was arrested while driving a van at the M25 Dartford Crossing in Kent. In the back were found two bags containing 20 kilos of cocaine with a street value of £1.6m, which he would have given to Salih had he not been arrested.
Jamie Sheaves (left) from Kent, and Kevin Malthouse (right) were also identified by police as part of the organized crime gang, working as drug dealers.
Officials from the Organized Crime Partnership – a joint unit of the National Crime Agency and the Metropolitan Police Service – identified supplies of around 80 kilos of cocaine as part of their investigation into Robert Smith, 37, and Ismet Salih, of 33, both from Grays in Essex (some of the medicines taken are pictured)
Twigg was arrested for this offense and for the seizure of a further 3.5kg of cocaine found in his garage and in an underground stash in his garden shed. A cannabis farm was also found in his loft.
He pleaded guilty and was jailed for nine and a half years at Northampton Crown Court in August 2021 for conspiracy to supply cocaine, possession with intent to supply cocaine and cannabis cultivation.
The cocaine seized at Twigg’s house had been supplied by Sheaves, who also supplied Salih with drugs. Sheaves was also in contact with the same person in Dubai.
Low was jailed after 40kg of cocaine with a street value of £3.2m was found in the boot of a black Jaguar XF in Brentford, west London. It was also discovered that he had supplied another man, Kevin Malthouse, with five kilos of cocaine.
The OCP investigation formed part of Operation Venetic, the UK law enforcement response to the July 2020 shutdown of the EncroChat encrypted communication service.
