TEESIDE CANNABIS KING ORDERED TO PAY UP
On 21 May 2007, Cleveland Police disrupted one of the North East’s largest cannabis farms which had been established in the former probation offices located at Longlands Road in Middlesbrough; the crop value was estimated to be in the region of £500,000.
Shafiq Aziz aged 39, Damion Clenaghan aged 23, Kaleem Khan (aka Kevin Felton) aged 26 and Liaquet Ali aged 50 were all arrested and charged with conspiracy to produce cannabis.
Shafiq Aziz was in possession of £12,000 cash, counterfeit currency and large quantities of equipment associated with the production of cannabis at his business premises and £15,000 cash at his home address. Some of the seized cash was found to be contaminated with THC, which is the active ingredient of cannabis.
Aziz later admitted that he was the manager of this cannabis farm and was subsequently sentenced to 3 years imprisonment.
Clenaghan and Khan (Felton) were deemed by the court to have played a lesser role in the conspiracy and were sentenced to 8 months and 12 months prison sentences suspended for 2 years and were also ordered to undertake 200 and 300 hours unpaid community work respectively.
Ali was said to have been used as the “front man” in order to secure the lease on the Longlands Road premises. He was sentenced to 12 months imprisonment suspended for 2 years, a 12 month supervision order and 300 hours unpaid community work.
Cleveland Police made a referral to the North East Regional Asset Recovery Team to undertake a confiscation investigation into the benefit that each defendant had derived from their criminal conduct.
On 2 March 2009 Teesside Crown Court the Judge ruled during the confiscation hearing that Ali’s benefit from the criminal conduct was £13,000 and an order was made that Ali should repay the sum of £5,000 which represented his available assets. Aziz has 6 months to pay over this money or face a default sentence of 3 months. The Court determined Khan and Clenaghan had a obtained a criminal benefit of £13,000 and nominal orders of £1.00 each were made against each man as they appeared to have no available assets.
The confiscation hearing for Shafiq Aziz was held on 30 July 2009 when the court declared his benefit from his criminal conduct to be £420,195.00 and made an order in the sum of £60,543.53 being the amount of assets in the defendant’s possession that were available to confiscate. Aziz was given six months to pay and faces a default prison sentence of twelve month if he fails to do so.
Should any defendant who has had a confiscation order made against them not satisfy the confiscation order in full within the agreed time limits the default prison sentences would be imposed by the Enforcement Team from Her Majesty’s court services who are co-located with the NE Regional Asset Recovery Team. This would not mean that the debt would go away, far from it, the defendant is still liable to settle in full any outstanding financial penalty imposed by the courts and the balance accrues daily interest until discharged.
Shafiq Aziz is related to Leyakt Sajawal from Sheffield who was recently jailed by Teesside Crown Court for 4 ½ years after admitting that he was the manager of the large scale regional operation to cultivate cannabis which included the site at Longlands Rd, Middlesbrough.
DCI Steve Waite, Head of The North East Regional Asset Recovery Team said: “This result sends out a clear message to those who engage in the production of cannabis that the police will take positive action to identify and prosecute those who set up and manage the cannabis farms. The North East Regional Asset Recovery Team can assist in this process by ensuring that any profit that these criminals have made from their criminal enterprises is removed from them and made available for the benefit of the community"
Inspector Mel Ashley the Senior Investigating Officer for Operation BASAR stated,” This man was the head of an organised crime group who had set up commercial premises in Middlesbrough to maximise profit from the production of a high grade of cannabis. It was always the intent of Cleveland Police along with their partner agency the Regional Asset Recovery Team to identify to identity the benefit of crime of this man and to obtain any assets he had at this time. Cleveland Police will continue to work with their partners to use the Proceeds of Crime Act to recover all the benefits of crime gained by such offenders. This case sends a strong message to those involved in organised crime seeking large profits that they will become subject of proceedings to recover all their profits