Two men in England were sentenced to 15 years in prison for attempting to traffic cocaine valued in about $341,875 camouflaged in cans of beans and condensed coconut milk.
Daniel Kelly and Steven Gilhooly, both aged 43, were sentenced on Wednesday at Snaresbrook Royal Court in London, according to the Metropolitan Police.
The duo managed to transport alleged canned goods that were actually drugs from the island of Saint Lucia, in the Caribbean, to South East London in December 2018.
Forensic examinations of the material revealed that the packages contained 2,341 kg of cocaine.
The traffickers sealed the cans with a special machine and blank can lids along with numerous items that They would later be sold on the island, according to the investigation. joint investigation between the United Kingdom’s National Crime Agency (NCA) and the Metropolitan Police.
The criminals flew from London to Saint Lucia, where they told officers that they were on vacation for Christmas .
Kelly sent the drug packages from a post office in Santa Lucía where p presented a fake driver’s license as identification.
Kelly and Gilhooly were arrested in January and March of 2020, respectively. In April last year they were charged with importing Class A drugs into the UK.
“This should send a clear and strong message to those who try to enter our borders that offenses of this nature we take very seriously and we will leave no stone unturned to bring them to justice, ”said the detective inspector of the Metropolitan Police Specialized Crime team, Matthew Webb.