The huge online distribution centre – based in an old mill warehouse near Bolton – was discovered when Customs officers tipped off the UK authorities following a sudden rise in psychoactive-substance use in Jersey in 2012.
When UK police officers raided the factory – in an industrial zone known by the drugs gang as Area 51 after the US airbase at the centre of UFO theories in Nevada – they found thousands of illegal substances and a database of 18,500 customers.
The products, which were sent through the post, were linked to at least one death in Britain, and left dozens of others in hospital.
All the drugs were being sold through the group’s website – Wide Mouth Frogs – which was at the centre of a JEP investigation into psychoactive-substance use in the Island three years ago.
Now, following a sentencing hearing at Bolton Crown Court, the gang’s leader – 46-year-old accountant turned criminal mastermind Paula White – is starting a nine-year jail sentence.
Her ‘lieutenant’ and former civil partner Netta Hymanson (64) – known in the factory as ‘the Headmistress’ – was locked up for four years.
They both pleaded guilty to conspiracy to supply class B drugs.
Meanwhile, Rudie Chiu (26), of Levenshulme in Manchester – who designed and ran Wide Mouth Frogs – was sentenced to two years’ jail, suspended for two years, after being found guilty of supplying class B drugs.
Four others were also sentenced to suspended jail terms for their part in the enterprise.
Speaking to the JEP today, Mark Cockerham, director of law enforcement at Customs, told how the service exposed the massive drugs operation.
‘There were postal packages containing controlled drugs which were being sent by the group,’ he said.
‘However, because they were being sent throughout the UK they were going under the radar.
‘But when they were sent here they came across a border control and we began to intercept them and we came to notice a pattern.’
Mr Cockerham confirmed that Wide Mouth Frogs was one of the most popular websites used by psychoactive-substance users in Jersey, and added: ‘We were able to see where they were coming from – because we could see where they were being posted from – and we could see what website was being used.
‘We collated this information and forwarded it to the UK and so the UK operation was initiated here in Jersey.’
During the sentencing hearing the court heard that the gang sold more than £3 million worth of drugs online to customers across the globe through Wide Mouth Frogs.
The site offered 35 different drugs, claiming they were legal products.
However, when the substances were analysed, 77 per cent were found to contain class B drugs in the same group as amphetamine and cannabis.
Sentencing the gang, Judge Peter Davies said that it was impossible for users to know what they were taking, adding: ‘They are hazardous, especially to those who are the targets of the market – the young, the inexperienced and the vulnerable.’
Addressing White, whom he described as a self-made entrepreneur who became a criminal, he said: ‘It was sophisticated, professional and operated on an industrial scale. The scale was vast.
- In October 2009, Jersey was the first place in the British Isles to ban the use and possession of legal highs and classify them under the drugs law.
- It followed a year-long battle by health officials to tackle the growing challenge of so-called party drugs as well as man-made cannabis and ecstasy substitutes.
- The local investigation into legal highs was launched in August 2008 after the JEP revealed that a number of festival-goers, including teenagers, were hospitalised after snorting and smoking herbal highs at Jersey Live.
- They included three 15-year olds; a 14-year-old and one 17-year old who were openly smoking and snorting legal highs, from a tent, in front of police officers at the popular festival.
- The Islands then deputy Medical Officer of Health, along with the then Health Minister, Jim Perchard, immediately launched an investigation into what they called a new and disturbing drug.
- As a result, Jersey then beat other countries, including the UK, Ireland, Isle of Man and Guernsey, to ban the use and possession of legal highs.
- Formerly known as legal highs, these are psychoactive drugs which contain various chemical ingredients, some of which are illegal while others are not
- They produce similar effects to illegal drugs such as cocaine, cannabis and ecstasy
- They are sold in a variety of forms, including powder, pills, liquids, capsules, perforated tabs and smoking mixtures
- A blanket ban was proposed in the Tories election manifesto and was also included in the Queens Speech
