Three guilty of flower delivery drugs racket

The defendants were all involved in a conspiracy to smuggle large quantities of cannabis from Holland into the UK. At Birmingham Crown Court Ashleigh Watkin, 38, David Thompson, 42, and Stuart Grant, 42, were all convicted of their role in the plot.

Watkin was also found guilty of being involved in the supply of cannabis.

A fourth defendant, 37-year-old driver Gary Davies, was cleared of being involved in the conspiracy and the supply of cannabis. Thompson, of Laburnam Avenue, Cannock; Grant, of Deansfield Road, Bearwood; Davies, of Willow Close, Market Drayton; and Watkin, of Rowney Close, Loggerheads, near Market Drayton, had all denied the allegations.

Judge Michael Chambers adjourned sentence for reports until next month when seven other men involved in the conspiracy are due to be sentenced.

At earlier hearings ringleaders Baan Klootwijk, a Dutch national, and David North, along with two other men, admitted conspiracy to import and to supply cannabis. Three other men pleaded guilty to supplying cannabis. During the trial the jury was told the cannabis smuggling plot was run from Baan Flower Trading on the Adderley Road Industrial Estate in Market Drayton between November, 2011 and February, 2013.

Dozens of cardboard boxes containing cannabis, hidden among cartons of fresh flowers, were ferried by lorry between Holland and Market Drayton and the estimated profit for the gang could have been at least £7 million.

Covert footage filmed outside a warehouse at Rijnsburg in Holland showed both Thompson and Grant arriving in refrigerated-lorries and boxes being loaded along with trolleys containing flowers.

The court heard that Watkin, an employee and office worker at Baan Flower Trading and drivers Grant and Thompson, were heard in recorded conversations talking to David North about the drugs.

The defendants were all arrested following a raid on a warehouse at the Adderley Road Industrial Estate.