How the wheels came off for... BRITAIN'S PABLO ESCOBAR

Colombian immigrant Jesus Ruiz-Henao built a £1billion drugs empire in the UK while covering his tracks as a bus driver. Now, as he gives his first TV interview behind bars, two former Met detectives reveal how they brought him to justice

- By James Rampton

JESUS Ruiz-Henao is known as "Britain's Pablo Escobar". Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, the Colombian-born crime overlord commanded the largest drugs ring in the UK, flooding our streets with more than £1billion worth of cocaine.

During that time, consumption of the drug in this country quadrupled.

In fact, apart from the US, Britain now takes more of it than any other nation in the world and Jesus is the crime boss behind this cocaine explosion.

His audacious run came to an end in 2006 when he was sentenced to 19 years in jail for conspiracy to supply drugs and money laundering.

At the height of his criminal activities he ran a 50-strong gang, with an estimated 20,000 operatives laundering money for him in Colombia.

He now lies in an US penitentiary after extradition from Colombia, awaiting a further drugs trial.

But how on earth did Jesus become the biggest drug trafficker in UK history and get away with his gargantuan criminal enterprise for so long?

The answer is he had the perfect cover.

He was a TfL bus driver in Hendon, north London. Unassumingly plying his trade on route 134, he was hiding in plain sight.

Now, as the former drugs baron gives his first television interview in new documentary The Bus Driver: Britain's Cocaine

King, two of the police officers responsible for bringing Jesus to justice have spoken to the Sunday Express about their five-year quest to apprehend him.

Former Detective Sergeant Ian Floyd and former DS Steve Lear, both now retired from the force, were part of the largest ever British police operation (outside terrorist investigations) to snare Jesus.

Five surveillance teams and more than a hundred officers were involved.

"He deliberately tried not to attract attention, he wasn't flash," says Ian.

"He wasn't up there in your face, which is what a lot of drug dealers are."