Drugs mastermind loses crime cash

15 January 2013 Last updated at 06:14 ET

A drug dealer who was jailed for 12 years over his part in an international drug ring is to have 70,000 seized under proceeds of crime laws.

Sohaib Qureshi, 35, from Bearsden, East Dunbartonshire, is thought to have made 1.2m from trafficking cocaine from Colombia and the Caribbean to Scotland.

He was jailed in March last year after being caught along with two other men.

Qureshi will have to give up his stake in a Glasgow restaurant to meet the confiscation order.

The businessman, who was once described as a millionaire property owner, denied the charges against him but was convicted following a trial last year at the High Court in Edinburgh.

The court heard how officers from the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency (SCDEA) targeted the drug smuggling operation which sourced high-purity cocaine in Colombia and the Dominican Republic.

As part of Operation Klaxon, undercover officers carried out surveillance on a house in Springburn, Glasgow, in April 2009.

Qureshi was seen at the house, along with Ronald Augustine, 53, from the city's Maryhill area and 37-year-old David Byrne, from Springboig, Glasgow.

When officers later stopped Qureshi and Byrne in a car, they found scales and other items used to cut and distribute drugs.

Link:
Drugs mastermind loses crime cash