UK News & Investigations

A HUGE seizure of suspected MDMA has been made on the M62 motorway. A Merseyside Police spokesperson said: "As part of a joint operation involving Matrix and Operation Medusa, we have arrested a man and seized large quantities of suspected MDMA following a stop check on the M62 yesterday, Tuesday 14 April." At around 7.20pm, officers from our Matrix Roads Policing Unit stop checked a Ford Transit van at Junction 7 of the M62, with the intention of checking documentation.  Dur

NEARLY a tonne of cocaine has been seized at Southampton Docks after the container they were in had sailed from Nicaragua via Panama to the UK. Two men have been charged as part of a National Crime Agency (NCA) investigation. The Class A drugs were seized at Southampton Docks after the container they were in had sailed from Nicaragua via Panama to the UK. Acting in partnership with the NCA, Border Force officers opened the container and found 943kg of cocaine with a street va

AN Emirates worker splashed cash on designer bags, shoes and luxury watches and had a boob job paid for while helping a crime gang smuggle millions of pounds of cash through Manchester Airport to Dubai, a court heard. Emma Rauf, 33, (above left) is alleged to have abused her position at the airline's check-in desk at Manchester Airport to waive hundreds of pounds of excess baggage fees of up to £800 for couriers who were smuggling huge amounts of used bank notes hidden in clo

A prolific waste criminal has been ordered to hand over more than £1.4 million for illegally dumping in excess of 4,275 tonnes of waste across England. A nationwide investigation by the Environment Agency uncovered a network of 16 illegal dumping sites, stretching from the northeast to the south coast. Farms, a historic manor house and a nature reserve were among the locations trashed. Varun Datta, 36, of Little Chester Street, London, must now pay £1.1 million, reflecting th

DRONES which can pinpoint buried illegal rubbish are set to be used to try to clampdown on the epidemic of illegal waste sites that are spreading across the country, UK News and Investigations can reveal. Environment Agency (EA) investigators hope to use specialist drones to fire lasers from above which will allow them to develop Detailed laser mapping and satellite imagery helping investigators catch offenders off-guard. It is one of a range of new measures to tackle waste c

A CAGE fighter convicted of the attempted murders of two men in Romania has avoided a second bid to extradite him after a British judge said forcing him back home to serve the sentence would breach his human rights. Convicted gangster Adrian Preda, 44, (both above) is wanted in Romania to serve jail terms for a series of violent offences and belonging to a notorious crime gang. But, he has been allowed to remain in the country after a judge said extradition would breach his r

Three men have been jailed for their involvement in the £1.1m robbery of a luxury watch shop "linked to Maurice Sines" the day after which store manager Oliver White took his own life. Mr White, 27, was put in a headlock and tied up during the raid at the 247 Kettles shop in Richmond, south-west London, in May 2024 while more than 70 high-value uninsured watches were stolen. Robbery mastermind Mannix Pedro, 38, (above middle) of Woking, Surrey, was today, February 6 2026, jai

The inquest into the death of £1.1m watch robbery victim Oliver White has been adjourned after allegations of the store being a "front for organised crime" emerged in court. Oliver White, 27, (below left) manager of the 247 Kettles store in Richmond, took his own life a day after CCTV of the raid, showing him being tied up, circulated on social media. An inquest into his death was listed to go ahead in December but was pulled at the eleventh hour after the criminal trial of t

A FUGITIVE British boxer who was on the run for two years before being arrested in Thailand has been jailed for 14 years for masterminding a multi-million pound cocaine and ketamine supply operation across the south east. Ben Ransome, 29, (both above) sat at the top of a criminal network which organised the sale of drugs in bulk to his customer base, which included dealers linked to firearms. He was found living in luxury on the holiday island of Phuket until his arrest at a

DRUG suppliers are using "cleanskin" adults to deliver their goods in the hope it will lead to less detections by police, it has emerged. Adults with no criminal past are offered regular well-paid shifts with expenses covered inthe hopeitwill lure them into being illegal delivery drivers to drug users. Details emerged during the prosecution of Claire Young, a woman, who said she was "buzzing" to work part time "shifts" as a drug courier, instead of a standard job. She avoided