Cannabis kingpin who made hundreds of thousands ordered to pay back less than £3,000

A drug dealer from Nottingham who made hundreds of thousands of pounds importing hundreds of kilos of cannabis from the USA has been ordered to pay back a tiny fraction of what he made. A Proceeds of Crime Act hearing at Nottingham Crown Court was told how police financial investigators calculated that Adenaurys Abreu profited to the tune of almost £400,000 selling the class B drugs on the city’s streets.

But analysis of his financial affairs and assets showed he has just under £3,000 to his name. And his “right hand man,” Akil Beale, who also made tens of thousands from their illegal drugs enterprise hasn’t a penny and so he was ordered to pay back a nominal £1 by the judge, Recorder Anna Trussler.

She said the benefit figure for Abreu is £391,857.87 and the available assets was £2,714.10. And the benefit figure for Beale is £26,358.17 and the available assets was £1. The Proceeds of Crime Act (or POCA) allows the police to apply for cash to be seized from criminals who have made their money from ill-gotten gains.

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It is typically used after drug dealers have been sentenced and can see criminals forced to sell properties, cars or jewellery that belong to them to pay the cash back. The money that is seized is usually split 50-50 between the police and the Government and is often used to fund community projects.

Importantly, if a convicted criminal comes into money later in life that he or she does not currently have, police can still apply to have that seized. At their sentencing hearing in January, the same court was told how Abreu imported more than 320kg of cannabis from the USA and had it delivered to various city addresses.

At that hearing, the 27-year-old, of St Ann's, was jailed for 10-and-a-half years while Beale received a six-year prison term for their parts in an enterprise that Abreu boasted he hoped to profit to the tune of £500,000 from. But their illegal activity came crashing down when they were arrested in a car with a bag full of the class B drug in Strelley and the full huge scale of their activities unfolded.

Jailing the pair, Judge Stuart Rafferty KC said: “You did not care about the misery you were putting on the streets, you simply went on relentlessly until you were caught and there is not a shred of evidence to suggest you were working for anyone else.

“142kg of what you imported was intercepted but 179kg was not intercepted. You, Beale, through greed became involved in this and you rose to be, effectively, his right hand man in the business, arranging deals, arranging runners and providing postcodes for collections.

“10kg of cannabis was found in a property linked to you so you were very much the storehouse too.”

Stephen Kemp, prosecuting in January, said police spotted both men leaving a property in Blidworth Close, Strelley, on January 16, 2023. He said the car they got into was stopped and in it was a carrier bag full of cannabis.

The prosecutor said that address was searched and just under 10kg of weed was found and phones were seized and on them was the evidence that Abreu had been regularly importing from the USA in bulk and having it delivered to 12 different addresses both in Nottingham and across the Midlands.

Mr Kemp said: “Some of the parcels had been intercepted but not all and one officer has produced an analysis showing the weights of what had been seized. In Eversley Walk, Bestwood, 42.6kg of had been delivered and 2.95kg to an address in Swallow Drive, Northampton.

“Other addresses included Langdale Road, Bakersfield; Cross Street, Carlton; Edward Avenue, Whitemoor; Rodwell Close, Beechdale and Woods Lane, Derby. 29 packages had been intercepted totalling 142.53kg and a suspected 180kg was not intercepted.”

Abreau, of Courtenay Gardens, pleaded guilty to importation of cannabis, supply of cannabis and possession of criminal property. Jabeen Akhtar, mitigating, said her client had started smoking cannabis at the age of 15 and became addicted to it in his late teens.

She said: “He looks after his ill mother on a daily basis and his father is also in extremely poor health. When the drugs were intercepted he was told he still needed to pay for the drugs and the debt got bigger.”

Beale, 25, of Thurgarton Street, Sneinton, pleaded guilty to supply of cannabis, possession with intent to supply cannabis and possession of criminal property. Digby Johnson, mitigating, said his client used to work for Nottingham City Council, firstly at the Eastcote depot and then at Byron House.

He said he then moved to Manchester in 2020 and then back to Nottingham in 2021 where he found work as a refuse collector for Gedling Borough Council. Mr Johnson said: “He accepts he became involved because of the temptation to earn some extra money.”