Gangsters who plotted revenge over theft of £1 million drugs stash convicted

The members of a Merseyside drugs gang who plotted revenge on men they mistakenly believed had stolen their £1 million cocaine stash have been convicted after police uncovered a plot through encrypted messages.

Vincent Coggins, 58, was head of the high-ranking crime group when international law enforcement intercepted the Encrochat messaging system in April 2020.

On May 23 2020, a "stash house" in Huyton, Merseyside, used by Coggins' gang to store drugs, was targeted by a group who posed as delivery drivers before launching a machete and axe attack and stealing more than £1 million of cocaine.

Manchester Crown Court heard in communications sent on Encrochat, Coggins, who was known as the "headmaster" and used the handle moonlitboat, expressed a desire to kill those responsible for the robbery, whom he wrongly identified as Brian Maxwell Junior, Michael Eves and Iyobosa Igbinovia.

Four other men from Salford, Greater Manchester, were later jailed for the robbery.

Messages between Coggins and associates including Paul Woodford, 58; Michael Earle, 48; and Edward Robert Jarvis, 59; showed discussions of plans for retribution.

Police, who were monitoring Encrochat messages, became aware of threats towards the men wrongly identified as the robbers by the Coggins organised crime group.

Threat-to-life notices were issued and the defendants were subject to disruption notices from police.

Those threats led to Maxwell Jr's father, Brian Maxwell Senior, giving money, property and land worth £1 million to the gang in a bid to save his son's life, the court heard.

On June 16 2020, three days after the Encrochat service alerted its users to the hack, the defendants were the first arrested by North West Regional Organised Crime Unit (NWROCU) officers as a result of the intercepted messages.

After they were charged, Coggins, Woodford, Earle and Jarvis attempted to have the Encrochat evidence thrown out in a bid which could have impacted hundreds of other cases.

In a legal argument seen as a test case for other Encrochat trials, their lawyers claimed the evidence was inadmissible, but their attempt was eventually dismissed by the court.

Most of the defendants pleaded guilty to offences but Jarvis, of Breckside Park, Liverpool, was convicted on Thursday, following a trial at Manchester Crown Court, of two counts of conspiracy to supply Class A drugs and conspiracy to commit blackmail, a spokeswoman for NWROCU said.

Reporting restrictions on the other cases were lifted on the conclusion of Jarvis's trial.

Coggins, of Woodpecker Close, Liverpool, was jailed for 28 years after pleading guilty to conspiracy to supply Class A drugs and conspiracy to commit blackmail.

Woodford, of Marl Road, Liverpool, was jailed for 24 years and six months and Earle, of Wallace Drive, Huyton, was jailed for 11 years after both pleaded guilty to conspiracy to supply Class A drugs and conspiracy to commit blackmail.

Paul Glynn, 59, of Croxdale Road West, Liverpool, who was minding the stash house where the cocaine was stored and was attacked in the robbery, was jailed for 11 years and two months after pleading guilty to conspiracy to supply cocaine.

Darren Tierney, 46, of Chatham Street, Stockport, was jailed for 12 years and nine months; Paul Fitzsimmons, 60, of Birch Tree Court, Liverpool, was jailed for 12 years and six months; Kevin Rimmer, 57, of Blacklow Brow, Huyton, was jailed for 16 years; and Dean Borrows, 39, of Ledson Grove, Liverpool, was jailed for 16 years after all pleaded guilty to conspiracy to supply class A drugs.

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