Truck boss jailed after drugs swoop

Jun 26 2009 by Cheryl McEvoy, Ayrshire Post (main ed)

A MILLIONAIRE Ayrshire trucking boss has been jailed for 11 years for smuggling over £600,000 worth of heroin into the country in the back of one of his lorries.

When customs officers searched Thomas Findlay’s trailer at Dover they found 12.45 kilos of the class A drug.

The quantity – which, when analysed was found to contain five kilos of pure heroin – had a street value of £647,000.

Findlay, 52, who owns Ayrshire firm TK Findlay, claimed he was innocent and has been used as the unwitting pawn of international drugs traffickers.

The dad-of-three was stopped as he returned to Britain after making a delivery of beef to Germany.

At his home in the small village of Skares, near Cumnock, he claimed: “The customs uncovered a package in the trailer, which I was later told had 12 kilos of amphetamine in it.

“I knew nothing about this and it must have been planted there.”

Findlay said after his arrest in Dover in February, 2007, his house and adjacent workshop and garage were searched by customs and drug squad officers.

But he said: “They found nothing. I am sick and tired of all the speculation there has been about this.

“One of my drivers said they heard someone in Cumnock saying I was smuggling in £10m worth of drugs.

“It is nonsense. I suspect I may have been set up and I’ve heard stories of traffickers planting drugs in trucks.

“I don’t know what happened or how these drugs came to be in my trailer.”

However at Canterbury Crown Court, Findlay was convicted of smuggling heroin and jailed for 11 years.

Until the end of 2006, TK Findlay had four lorries based at an abattoir at Brentwood in Essex, but the fleet has since been reduced.

A spokeswoman for HM Revenue and Customs said: “HM Revenue & Customs officers intercepted Thomas Findlay, 52, in the freight controls at Dover Eastern Docks on February 6, 2007.

“Findlay had arrived in his lorry by ferry from Calais and was arrested after the drugs were found under boxes of Pepperamis.

“The heroin was in unmarked boxes sealed with tape.

“Findlay was charged with drug smuggling offences under the Customs and Excise Management Act 1979.

“He was found guilty on June 19, 2009.”

Malcolm Bragg, HMRC assistant director criminal investigation, said: “The success of this latest operation highlights our proactive role in reducing the availability of drugs in the UK.

“Heroin has a devastating impact on individuals as well as the wider effect on local communities.

“We will continue to take stringent action and work with our prosecutors to bring individuals before the courts.”