Drug dealer must pay back proceeds
Wednesday 29th July 2009, 11:40AM BST.
A major drugs dealer from the Black Country who was jailed for 10 years has been told he must pay back more than £175,000 in cash made through crime.
Daljinder Bassi, of Stafford Road, Oxley, Wolverhampton, was jailed in April after police seized cash, drugs and ammunition worth more than half a million pounds.
At Wolverhampton Crown Court, Judge Nicholas Webb ruled the 34-year-old must hand over £175,466.55 within six months, or face a further 13 months behind bars.
Bassi, a former amateur footballer with Halecroft Youth FC in the Black Country-based Beacon League, sat motionless in the dock as he the order was made.
Mr Andrew Lockhart, prosecuting, said: “He pleaded guilty on February 13 and was jailed on April 1. We have all reached an agreement that we will only deal with his bank accounts.
“We have agreed to not take into account a bank account belonging to his mother and child.”
The figure was decided upon after the Crown Prosection Service went through the bank accounts belonging to Bassi.
He has already signed some paperwork, indicating that he has consented for the money to be taken from his account while he is in jail.
Police swooped on his home earlier this year and found heroin worth more than £197,000 and everything needed to process the Class A drug, including chemicals, as well as £49,440 in bundles of cash.
Officers then went to his sister Rajvinder Bassi’s home in Stafford Road, Fordhouses. They found £136,800 in cash, traces of heroin and the keys to a Honda Civic.
The Honda was found at the BP service station on Stafford Road, a location the siblings’ nephew Karandeep Sandhu had moved it to after the police raid, because he knew his uncle was a dealer.
In the boot was a safe, the keys to which were found in Daljinder’s bedroom. It was opened and contained £167,110 in cash, some cocaine and 92 rounds of ammunition.
Daljinder Bassi pleaded guilty to conspiracy to supply class A drugs and possession of ammunition and got 10 years in jail, while Rajvinder Bassi was given 21 months in April after admitting possession of the cash.
Sandhu, aged 21, of Powell Street, Park Village, admitting assisting an offender and was given six months custody.
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