Rotherham businessman and taxi driver in cocaine plot, court told

Businessman Omar Sadique (29), of Regent Street, Kimberworth, is accused of running a prolific business on a national scale supplying cutting agents—which are cut together with raw cocaine to make a higher volume product that can still be sold as cocaine—to an alleged regional distributor.

Taxi driver Zakir Hussain (29), of Ferham Road, Rotherham, is charged with assisting in the supply of controlled drugs.

Maidstone Crown Court heard claims that defendant Ty Ripley used a clock tower on land at Fairmeadow Farm in Bredgar, Sittingbourne, Kent, to store chemicals such as caffeine, lidocaine, phenacetin and benzocaine.

Prosecutor Mr Allister Walker said Ripley (40), was “at the very hub” of the case as a regional distributor of the cutting agents supplied to him by Sadique.

When police officers searched the farm in Swanton Street in February 2010, they discovered a barrel in the clock tower containing plastic bags of white powder.

It was found to be caffeine, lidocaine, phenacetin and benzocaine. Also discovered were Class C drugs mephodrone and piperazine.

Mr Walker said the seven men and two women on trial played varied, significant and organised roles in the supply of Class A drugs in the UK.

Cutting agents, he said, were an integral part of drug trafficking.

“What is revealed in this case is a supply chain that runs from the national distribution of cutting agents, both direct to the drugs trade and to regional suppliers of cutting agents here in Kent and on to local cutters and suppliers of cocaine,” Mr Walker told the court.

A kilo of cocaine diluted with a kilo of cutting agent left two kilos of a product that could still be sold as cocaine.

Mr Walker said Sadique ran a prolific distribution business of chemical cutting agents under the guise of his company OA Supplies Ltd and supplied them direct to drug dealers and regional distributors such as Ripley.

He said Sadique had premises at Valley Works industrial estate in Ecclesfield, Sheffield. When searched in February 2010, a substantial store of cutting agents was found.

Hussain, Sadique’s cousin, was a mini cab driver in Rotherham who also worked for OA Supplies. It was alleged he was a courier and assistant for Sadique until the end of 2009. He delivered chemicals to Ripley in August 2009, it is claimed.

Sadique, Hussain and two other defendants from the Essex area deny assisting in the supply of controlled drugs.

Sadique and five other defendants deny conspiracy to supply cocaine

Ripley further denies possessing a Class C drug with intent to supply,

The trial continues.