Cocaine dealing brothers who supplied drugs to Bucks and beyond were part of trio jailed for 34 years

Three men who ran a drugs empire across Bucks and large swathes of the country have been handed long prison sentences.

A trio of drug dealers were given jail sentences on Monday (August 9) for their large scale cocaine supply operation.

Police identified a pair of brothers from Hemel Hempstead as the kingpins, Ansar and Ajmal Akram.

The brothers used encrypted phones to organise exchanges of multiple kilogrammes of cocaine at a time.

Police say it took a six-month surveillance operation to bring down the drugs empire.

Detectives pursued the group for half a year in 2019, they identified Ansar as the puppet master with Ajmal as his lieutenant.

The detectives' investigation took them to Yorkshire, Dorset, Middlesbrough, Leicester, Luton and Northampton, as well as Bucks.

At each stop the brothers would distribute high amounts of drugs to other organised crime groups.

During the investigation police seized 6.5kg of cocaine, in excess of £150,000 cash and three encrypted handsets, although the police believe this is just a snapshot of the group’s activity.

A third man, Ryan Brockley, from Leicestershire, acted as a regional wholesaler and was instrumental in a number of exchanges. He was also arrested in October 2019.

At a St Albans Crown Court hearing on Monday, the trio were each sentenced as follows:

-Ansar Akram, 34, of Thumpers, Hemel Hempstead, was jailed for 15 years after pleading guilty to conspiracy to supply cocaine and possession of criminal property

-Ajmal Akram, 30, of Thumpers, Hemel Hempstead, was jailed for 14 years after being found guilty of conspiracy to supply cocaine and possession of criminal property

-Ryan Brockley, 34, of Deepdale, Leicester, was jailed for five years after pleading guilty to conspiracy to supply cocaine

Detective Inspector Ian Mawdesley, from Eastern Region Special Operations Unit, said: "It's apparent that Ansar and Ajmal Akram were instrumental in the distribution of a significant amount of cocaine across a huge geographical area, and to know they will be in jail and unable to bring further misery to our communities for an extended period is fantastic.

“Ansar, who headed up the group, thought nothing about directing the operation from the security of his home in an attempt to keep his hands clean, whilst putting others in the group at risk. This included his younger brother, Ajmal, who met with couriers to collect the money.

“By removing those individuals in charge of criminal gangs such as this from society, not only are we keeping them away from causing further harm but we're also stopping the flow of dangerous illegal substances across the country.

“Through monitoring their activity, we were also able to piece together the involvement of a number of other OCGs, which will feed into other investigations already taking place by police colleagues across the country.

“This outcome is the result of a painstaking operation from a large number of investigators, many of whom have spent hundreds of hours tracking the group, establishing their involvement, and compiling significant amounts of evidence. I can only thank them for their exceptional work.”

Three other men pleaded guilty on Wednesday (August 11) to charges of conspiracy to supply a class A drug, and are due to be sentenced on September 6. They are:

-Jameel Khan, 27, of Winchester Street, Nottingham

-Ali Zarei, 27, of Derngate, Northampton

-Sarfraz Asif, 40, of Dordans Road, Luton