Gang smuggled medication and telephones into London prisons almost day-after-day for months, court docket hears

A gang smuggled drugs, phones, Sim cards and a knife into prisons on 70 occasions using drones, a court heard.

Seven men admitted their roles in a ‘serious, organised and prolific enterprise’ to supply drugs, including cannabis, and knives into prisons across London and the South East.

Shafaghatullah Mohseni, 29, Hashim Al-Hussaini, 28, Mohammed Hamoud, 22, Faiz Salah, 29, Zahar Essaghi, 51, Mustafa Ibrahim, 30, and Emanuel Fisniku, 25, began a sentencing hearing at Harrow Crown Court, sitting at Hendon Magistrates’ Court in Edgware, on Monday.

They would drive to the prisons, often in the early hours of the morning, and fly packages filled with contraband through cell windows using drones.

The gang targeted at least nine prisons including Wormwood Scrubs, Brixton and Pentonville, the court heard.

Prosecutor Sam Barker said the group visited prisons 70 times between December 2 2024 and February 26 2025 and operated around 140 drone flights in total.

The Metropolitan Police said the gang was responsible for 75% of all drone drops into London prisons during this time.

One drone crashed into a woman’s back garden near HMP Wandsworth, the court was told.

Shafaghatullah Mohseni was the ‘grand delivery driver’ for the gang, a court was told

Police found a drone, a knife and two packages containing phones and cannabis in a car on the way to HMP Norwich

She told officers a man had knocked on her door to collect it in the early hours of the morning but she refused.

The court heard officers arrested Mohseni, Al-Hussaini, Hamoud and Fisniku driving to a drop at HMP Norwich on February 26 last year after being tipped off that a knife was going to be smuggled into the prison.

They found a JD Sports bag in the car with a drone, a knife and two packages containing phones and cannabis.

The prosecution said Mohseni was involved in all 70 drone drops as the ‘grand delivery driver’.

Mr Barker said: ‘It is reasonable to infer that he was responsible for every single flight taken.’

Prisoners’ relatives sent large sums of money to Mohseni to pay for the smuggled items, the court heard.

Mohseni received £26,785 from 14 people who were directly linked to a serving inmate at a prison where he was delivering items, according to Mr Barker.

He was at the centre of a ‘web of financial transfers’ which saw him receive money with which he paid his co-conspirators.

Hashim Al-Hussaini (left) and Mohammed Hamoud were part of the gang which smuggled phones, Sim cards and drugs into prisons

Zahar Essaghi (left) and Mustafa Ibrahim will be sentenced on Tuesday with the five other defendants

Emanuel Fisniku (left), of Islington, and Faiz Salah, of north-west London, smuggled drugs including cannabis, Xanax and Valium into prisons

Michael McAlinden, defending, said Mohseni began offending as a means to pay off his debts. 

The gang was caught as part of Operation Buzzbin, a Met investigation into drones being used to smuggle drugs, phones, USB sticks and other contraband into prisons, Mr Barker said.

However the prosecution accepted the defendants ‘may not have been aware’ that a flick knife was inside one of the packages they flew because they may not have packed them themselves.

As a result it dropped a charge of conspiring to convey a knife into prison.

Along with cannabis, the defendants also smuggled Xanax and Valium.

Mohseni, of Edgware, Salah, of north-west London, Essaghi, of north-west London, Ibrahim, of Harrow Weald, Fisniku, of Islington, Al-Hussaini, of Harrow, and Hamoud, of Harrow, all remain in custody ahead of receiving their sentences.

In July last year, the chief inspector of prisons Charlie Taylor warned of the increased risk drones would pose for smuggling drugs into prisons.

Mr Taylor said: ‘There is a level of risk that’s posed by drones that I think is different from what we’ve seen in the past.

‘What I’d like to see is that the prison service really gets a grip of this issue and we’d like to see the Government, security services coming together, using technology, using intelligence, so that this risk doesn’t materialise.’

The sentencing will conclude on Tuesday morning.