In Dundee, a drug dealer claimed he had been forced to deal heroin by a heavily armed Birmingham gang in a practice known as ‘being cuckooed.’ After claiming he had been scared and had tried numerous times to contact the police, he has been curfewed This is an extremely minor punishment for heroin dealing suggesting his story has been believed.
Dundee heroin peddler on curfew for dealing ‘after being cuckooed’
We’ve known for some times that the above practice employed by large English ‘County Lines’ drug gangs has spread across Scotland and is being studiously ignored by the BBC.
From June 2023:
Only the Daily Record, the Courier and the Evening Standard are reporting these dramatic events from yesterday:
Four gang members have been jailed and a missing child rescued after police rumbled a major drugs line from London to Dundee.
Officers from the Met Police launched a probe after concerns were raised for the welfare of the 16-year-old on November 14 last year.
Detectives discovered the youth, from Croydon, had travelled north of the border earlier that month – closely followed by Malik Paul, 26, Michael Nwadire, 28, Dylan Newman, 21, and Ellis Davey, 22.
Operation Orochi was launched with officers racing to Dundee where they began a major joint investigation with Police Scotland’s Serious and Organised Crime Team.https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/missing-boy-found-scots-cuckooed-30349815
BBC Scotland, STV, the Herald and the Scotsman have no coverage. Imagine it was a Scottish gang doing this in England? Do think it Anti-English or maybe damaging for the image of the Union when they can do the King’s new sword instead?
The silence on this is not new.
In 2019, I wrote:
Police Scotland reported the problem as early as January 2019:
The charity Crime-stoppers is today 14th January 2019 launching a campaign to highlight the pain and suffering that criminals from English cities are inflicting on vulnerable people in Scotland’s rural and coastal towns. The campaign aims to raise awareness of County Lines, which is when criminals from major cities such as Liverpool, Manchester, London and Birmingham are expanding their drug networks to other areas, bringing with it serious criminal behaviour such as violence, exploitation and abuse. The term County Lines refers to the use of a single telephone number to order drugs, operated from outside the local area. This is having a massive impact on rural communities and also on vulnerable children and adults who are being recruited in cities such as Manchester and Liverpool.
Only the Sunday Post reported this at the time.
So, a Police Scotland announcement and clearly some media aware of it. Why have BBC Scotland not considered it in the public interest when it sounds eminently so? Are they worried it would seem anti-English?
I had thought that only the Police Scotland warnings were being ignored by the Scottish MSM but have since stumbled on two more public reports they must have seen.
In August 2019, again unreported, Youthlink Scotland held a conference aimed at developing: ‘the latest guidance and good practice on how to identify, support, and help young and vulnerable victims of criminal exploitation.’
On its own, this has all the marks of newsworthiness – young victims, exploitation. Any half-decent investigative journalists would be salivating but BBC Scotland Disclosure don’t like the look of it.
But then, I see a link in the charity announcement which takes me to a Scottish Government investigation from June 2018 (!). It’s hard to understand why this was not headlined. See these extracts from Community Experiences of Serious Organised Crime in Scotland:
- Evidence from drug market research and policing suggests that the most common route for illicit commodities into Scotland is through the open border with England, with major drug supply routes entering the country by road and rail.
- The profitability of the heroin trade has however led to an increase in SOC groups from England penetrating markets in north and rural Scotland. These groups use road, train, and bus routes to create steady supply routes in these areas, effectively ‘bypassing’ the traditional groups in Scotland’s central belt and directly accessing other markets in rural areas. A police officer noted the regularity of the trade, with ‘young people or low-level patsies acting as couriers’.
- ‘There’s an awful lot of folk coming up from [city in north England] and they’ll target a house, they’ll basically just come into the house and, and they’ll take over the house while they’re dealing their drugs and giving that tenant what they need so they can use their house and that… The best explanation that I’ve heard is [in] our area, there’s not a firm, like, family that’s in control of the drugs. So they’re just coming up and taking advantage of that (Police Officer, National Diffuse).’
- They [OCGs in the local area] are linked to a group in the north [of England] … the group have not come up to supplant the indigenous group as there are no turf wars. Rather they co-operate with drug supply, but also collaborate on some other criminal activities… [they] had a guy living in the area. What the group added was increased capacity in terms of supply and sourcing drugs and increased flexibility in terms of moving drugs north (Police Officer, National Diffuse).
Also, in 2021, we saw:
When I first heard the voices on the short video showing a knife and machete attack on a 16 year-old, I detected an English accent.
Only the Daily Record likewise commented:
The group of youths, who appeared to have English accents, were caught on camera on Argyle Street in the city centre at 8.30pm on Thursday evening.
BBC Scotland has ignored the report. This fits with their agenda to ignore anything that their viewers might think casts the Union in a negative light.
The Glasgow Times even labelled them ‘Glasgow thugs.‘
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
Ah, but … if therr wisnae a demand fur drugs in Scotland, thae dealers frae England widnae be comin up tae sell them.It’s jist demand and supply. Ye cannae blame thum kin ye? They jist want tae make a profit like good capitalists an Tory an Labour like capitalists. If therr wis nae demand they widnae come. It’s as simple as that. If Jocks wisnae weak willed, therr’d be nae demand.
This is the narrative being developed by the many hacks employed at the UK propaganda service at Elizabeth House in Edinburgh.
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I watched a documentary a few years ago about ‘County line’ drug gangs and to be honest I am amazed that the huge media coverage EVERY year on ‘Scotland’s’ drug problem has NOT noted how many of these drugs get here in the first place.
I suspect the BBC….I mean I KNOW the BBC …..choose not to pursue or disclose this aspect because it does not fit their agenda where they want to give the impression that all blame is with the Scottish government but also it casts a negative light on the current open border between us and England….borders being something the opposition parties deploy as a lost ‘benefit’ that they present as one of the ‘negative’ consequences should Scotland become independent…..(it certainly was not a negative during Covid for OTHER countries in the world in them being able to CLOSE their borders but it does appear to be a negative for us in Scotland via English County drug gangs and the OPEN border between us and England …..which yes is a clue as to why the BBC will not pursue this)…..
Perhaps the Scottish government should publicise or even initiate something being done in respect to the IMPACT County Line drug gangs are having in Scotland…..it then gives people here, who may be oblivious to it as a huge problem, that there is MORE to this drug problem than just how the BBC and opposition parties like to portray it as being….as in somehow ALL the fault of the Scottish government.
Thank you for highlighting this…and too kudos to the limited amount of media willing to disclose this also…..alas the BBC prefers their news to be sourced from opposition parties, who themselves, for obvious reasons will not touch THIS aspect of ‘our’ ? drug problem in Scotland with a barge pole…….
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Thanks
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The ‘media’ is fast out of the trap when reporting Scotland the drugs capital of the United Kingdom (pointing fingers at Dundee in particular) but very much slower when concerns head across the border. We would be forgiven for whispering the ‘b’ word in this case.
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I would think the same thing is happening in Wales and probably in Ireland it’s what drug dealing does , the people involved don’t care what nationality you are it’s about money.
The BBC and British newspapers in Scotland want us all in Scotland to believe that Scotland and its people are inferior beings and rely on England so it suits them to lie about the damage done to Scotland by being a neighbour of England.
Always has been always will be.
England will always be our neighbour .
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The so called media are owned and run by very dodgy and very very rich folk, the BBC is owned and run by the English government. Some folk are extremely rich at the top of the drugs business. Scotland is open to massive exploitation, the drugs cartels must look at it and rub their (lives wrecking, communities destroying) blood stained hands together with glee.
Meanwhile we had police Scotland under instruction to raid the FMs home, investigating anything they hope they can find against her and others that the EngGov see as a threat to their gravy train that is Scotland. How much has that farce all cost so far? How many police hours, which could have been far better spent in finding and arresting these dangerous drugs gangs from England.
I don’t suppose the English police or their government are bothered, it suits them to allow drugs gangs to terrorise people and communities in Scotland.
ScotGov need to start shouting loudly about this and not shy away from telling people that it’s gangs from England, coming into Scotland and causing suffering to our people, and abusing those who are vulnerable. The English police should be stopping these drugs gangs in their own cities in England, surely with modern tech, it’s not too hard to track them down.
Road and rail aren’t the only way these criminals get into Scotland, I heard from someone in the know, that they can easily land boats because Scotland has a vast coastline which is not really policed as marine policing is a reserved power to the English government.
When the dangerous criminals are arrested can they be sent back to England to be dealt with rather than Scotland having to foot the bill to arrest them, take them to court and lock them up, hope so.
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Excellent comment ArtyHetty……and I too think the Scottish government should be raising this as a factor…. as all of those who are ever so vocal in their supposed ‘concern’ on this problem will never explore or highlight it as a huge factor…..for obvious reasons….mind you they also do not CONSTANTLY raise how Scotland has dealt with Knife crime…..as in dealing with it in a positive and successful way….against what is tragically happening in England….where the English government are failing to resolve it as a CONSTANT huge and growing issue….
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Seem to remember ( indyref 14) the continuous propaganda onslaught on a hard border between Scotland and England being justified because cheap drugs and of course immigrants would flood England from the continent using Scotland as the backdoor.
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Must check that
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