Customs intercept major cocaine haul

Thursday 18 December 2014

Jersey Customs officers have seized £500,000 worth of cocaine which they believe was headed for local streets.

In a joint operation with the French, they picked up 4kg of the Class A drug on the French coast. John Anthony O’Sullivan, aged 57 years, was arrested in Granville and has since appeared in court in France.

Officers are still investigating in Jersey, and have since conducted a number of local searches. 

Mark Cockerham, Director of Law Enforcement, said: “The quantity of cocaine seized is significant and had it been imported and distributed in Jersey this would have led to a large supply being available at user level."

In reality this cocaine would most likely be cut down again several times achieving higher and higher profits for those at each level of the supply chain. Whilst we have seen a marked increase in the seizures of New Psychoactive Substances (NPS) this year, this demonstrates that there is still a demand for Class A drugs in Jersey and we are pleased to have prevented this consignment from being imported into our Island."

In total, Customs seized around £2,376,373 of drugs in 2013 alone.