Scotland Yard was celebrating last night after the conviction of a flamboyant international drugs baron who ran a multi-million-pound crack cocaine empire spanning five countries and supplying every major city in the UK.
By Rosie CowanOwen Clarke, 46, a Jamaican nicknamed The Father, ran dozens of mules - women who smuggle drugs through British airports and harbours.
The drugs were then sent by coach or train around Britain to "lieutenants" who distributed them to dealers further down the line.
He faces years in jail after being caught through a three-year undercover police investigation, codenamed Jasle, the biggest ever carried out by Operation Trident, aided by the National Criminal Intelligence Squad, Customs, the Jamaican authorities and the FBI.
Detective Superintendent Adrian Hanstock, of Trident, told the Guardian: "We are absolutely ecstatic. It's a phenomenal example of how the police can get someone at the top of such a complex international drugs operation through sheer hard work."
During his three-week trial at Snaresbrook crown court, north-east London, Clarke claimed he had been forced to deal drugs by Mark Lambie, convicted but later cleared of killing PC Keith Blakelock and currently serving 12 years for kidnap and blackmail.
But the jury took fewer than five hours to convict him of possession with intent to supply and conspiracy to manufacture crack cocaine.
Clarke, who is married to an Englishwoman, lived in a modest two-bedroom bungalow in the village of Sudbury, north of London.
But he led a fantastic lifestyle, with at least three houses in Jamaica where he threw lavish parties. He would regularly invite up to 7,000 people to La Russe nightclub in Kingston, where he raked in up to US$5m to plough back into his drugs business.
Clarke was trapped when undercover officers saw him handing over a bag containing ?7,000 in cash in Strode Road, Harlseden, north London last year. Clarke's co-accused, Napoleon Ernonini, a 42-year-old Nigerian of Bow, east London, was acquitted of conspiracy to supply crack cocaine.
Two other defendants, Jason Sadler, 24, of Willesden, north-west London, and 21-year-old Evan Powell, of no fixed abode, admitted drugs offences and will be sentenced with Clarke next week.
