The 'idiot' jailed for importing cocaine

DRUGS VALUED AT £120M BROUGHT IN INSIDE ARTIFICIAL GRASS ROLLS AND STORED IN STOCKTON

- By ROB KENNEDY

COCAINE weighing a tonne-and-a-half and worth £120m was imported inside rolls of artificial grass to warehouses in Stockton and Newcastle.

Peter Lamb - who has been jailed for 17 years - set up and registered two “cover” companies, with warehouses based in the North East, to import the fake turf from mainland Europe into the UK.

Newcastle Crown Court heard that in May, 2024, customs officers in Holland searched two of the consignments and found the artificial grass rolls contained special compartments where a total of £13m of cocaine was hidden.

National Crime Agency officers then raided Lamb's warehouse buildings including one at Primrose Hill Industrial Estate in Stockton and found abandoned turf rolls from 18 previous consignments, which contained the same secret compartments.

The court heard most of the “hides” were empty, save from one that contained a kilo of cocaine that had been “overlooked”.

None of the artificial grass that was imported had been sold on to customers.