Smugglers’ record-breaking haul of cocaine valued at £186million and hidden in a banana cargo boat was uncovered in a sting straight out of a Hollywood thriller.
Just over 2.3 tonnes were secreted in 41 pallets of fruit in Colombia, before being intercepted when arriving at Portsmouth Harbour in February 2021.
But at the Old Bailey this week details of an incredible covert police operation were revealed that blew open the plot to flood London with the drug.
Officers replaced the cocaine with more fruit and pretended to be lorry drivers to deliver the drugs to a bogus grocery warehouse the smugglers had set up in Enfield, north London.
There armed police arrested four of the gang at the warehouse and recovered a loaded revolver hidden on a roof beam as well as the electronic key flat to a flat in nearby Islington.
The flat was empty and it was obvious no-one was staying there, the court heard.
Just over 2.3 tonnes of cocaine were secreted in 41 pallets of fruit in Colombia, before being intercepted when arriving at Portsmouth Harbour in February 2021, jurors have been toild
Petko Zhutev (pictured) has been described as the ‘face’ of the drug smuggling gang
The drugs deiivery discovered in Portsmouth in 2021 was valued at at least £186million
And yet under the kitchen cabinets police found another 33 kilo blocks of cocaine from a previous shipment worth £1.24million wholesale and with a street value of at least £2million.
Prosecutor Kevin Dent KC told the court: ‘That address Flat 7 The Yard, Islington had been uses as a storehouse for significant amounts of cocaine.’
Mr Dent said Albanian Erik Muci, 44, who was not been arrested at the grocery warehouse, was one of the bosses of the operation.
He added: ‘Muci, acting together with others had been directing the onward distribution of this cocaine.’
Deliveries had been from the address to dealers across north east and east London.
Muci was not arrested for eight months after the warehouse raid at his home in Hornchurch, Essex.
The ‘face’ of the operation, Petko Zhutev, 39, had been on trial but admitted the offence in the final week of the four-month hearing.
Muci, 44, and Olsi Ebeja, 40, denied fraudulent evasion of prohibited class A drugs but were convicted by an Old Bailey jury.
Muci was also convicted of being concerned in the supply of a class A drug.
Two other men, Gjergii Diko, 32, and Bruno Kuci, 40, earlier admitted smuggling cocaine, possession of a prohibited firearm and possession of ammunition without a certificate.
The court heard the cocaine was dispatched from Columbia on January 26.
Police found, under kitchen cabinets, 33 kg blocks of cocaine from a previous shipment worth £1.24million wholesale and with a street value of at least £2million
Bruno Kuci (pictured), 40, admitted smuggling cocaine, possession of a prohibited firearm and possession of ammunition without a certificate
Mr Dent said: ‘There had been sophisticated planning for this operation during a period of at least six weeks prior to the delivery on February 18.
‘This involved a number of aspects, including the sending of from Columbia of three other consignments without cocaine as a trial dry runs.’
Zhutev set up the bogus company called Agro Foods on December 30 2020, being a director of the firm.
He rented the warehouse, bought refrigeration equipment and also rented a forklift to move the 41 pallets.
The smugglers had also purchased untraceable Dutch SIMs for phones and had armed themselves with a 9mm calibre Turkish Atak Arms Zotaki.
Originally designed to discharge tear gas cartridges, the firearm had been converted to fire live ammunition.
The revolver contained six unfired modified.380-inch calibre blank cartridges.
Mr Dent said: ‘On 18 February 2021, two police officers acting covertly as lorry drivers delivered a consignment of bananas to a warehouse and storage unit called Agro Food Unit.
‘Officers making the delivery were operating covertly as, four days earlier, UK Border Force at Portsmouth had found within a consignment of 41 pallets of bananas, pallets containing 2,330 blocks of cocaine, each block around 1kg in weight.
‘This had arrived from Colombia. Before delivery of the load on 18 February 2021, delivered to Agro Foods Ltd by officers acting as lorry drivers, the pallet numbers of the four pallets containing drugs had been noted and the cocaine had been removed from the consignment.
Olsi Ebeja (pictured), 40, denied fraudulent evasion of prohibited class A drugs but has been convicted by an Old Bailey jury
Gjergii Diko (pictured) was among drug smugglers who posed as wholesale grocers to import one of Britain’s biggest seizures of cocaine inside a consignment of Colombian bananas
‘The pallets that previously had cocaine packed on them were replaced by more bananas.
‘The wholesale value of the cocaine seized was in excess of £90 million.. The street value is in the region of £186million.’
Mr Dent added: ‘At the time this was the largest ever inland seizure by UK officers.’
Zhutev took delivery of the bananas from the two lorries and supervised Diko and Kuci.
Two hours later police arrived in force to arrest the gang and found the pallets which were meant to contain cocaine were already being broken down.
Zhutev Diko and Kuci where arrested at the warehouse and Ebeja was found in a van nearby acting as a driver and lookout man
‘He was present and ready to transport the cocaine, once it had been successfully delivered and sorted at Agro Foods,’ the prosecutor said.
Muci, of Haynes Road, Hornchurch, and Ebeja, of Malta Street, Islington, denied but were convicted of fraudulent evasion of prohibited class A drugs.
Zhutev, of no fixed address, Diko and Kuci, admitted fraudulent evasion of prohibited class A drugs.
The trial was meant to take three months but lasted more than five and Judge Rebecca Trowler, KC, excused the jury from any future service.
The jury had deliberated for 47 hours and 28 minutes.