Five men have been jailed after a National Crime Agency investigation into an attempt to bring 425kg of cocaine into Eastbourne Marina. Officers arrested them on 8 June as they unloaded the drugs from the fishing vessel New Horizon. The cocaine was valued at £34 million.
NCA officers had been monitoring the organised crime group for several months. The drugs were packed in waterproof bags fitted with a GPS tracker and dropped into the English Channel from another vessel. The group planned to collect the bags, bring them ashore and pass them to other crime groups around the UK.
Joint organisers Alan Colquhoun, 49, and William Donohoe, 38, expected to receive £80,000 for retrieving the drugs. They surveyed the south coast, chose a landing spot and hired a van in Scotland, claiming it would be used to transport pub stock.
