He went on Thailand getaway to lose weight and came back with 40 kilos of cannabis

A man claimed he went on a Thailand getaway to lose weight - but was caught on his way back to Manchester with 40 kilos of cannabis.

Ahmed Sohail, 26, was stopped at Manchester Airport by Border Force officials with two suitcases. He claimed he had been in Bangkok for eight days on a luxury trip.

However, when officers scanned the two bags, they discovered 40 kilograms of the class B drug and an Apple electronic tracking device.

READ MORE: Police officer suffers 'most traumatic event of his life' after going up to man in van

Sohail admitted being concerned in the fraudulent evasion on the importation of drugs on the basis that he was being directed by others and that he did not receive any payment for his part. He was handed a suspended sentence.

Sophie Kenny, prosecuting, said that after his arrest on August 21 this year, x-ray machines were used to search the suitcases.

Within both of them were multiple vacuum sealed packages of a ‘herbal substance’. It was tested and found to be cannabis, she said.

“He was taken to a private interview room and searched. The total weight of the cannabis was 40.44 kilograms,” she added.

Sohail was interviewed but refused to provide a PIN number for his phone.

In mitigation, his barrister Benjamin Kaufman said that both of Sohail’s parents have been diagnosed with cancer.

“He played a limited function - he appears to have been taken advantage of by those more criminally sophisticated than him,” he said.

“He is anxious about his mother’s health, she is suffering from stage 4 cancer.”

Mr Kaufman added that since his arrest, Sohail had been in custody and found the experience ‘sobering and traumatic’.

“His family are distraught,” he said.

Handing him an 18 month jail term suspended for two years, Judge Suzanna Goddard KC said that he was ‘intelligent but foolish and naïve’.

“You claimed to have gone on holiday to lose weight,” she said, reading from a presentence report prepared by the probation service.

“You said you were in the wrong place at the wrong time. You presented as immature and unaware of the seriousness of your offending.

“It seems to me that you are very immature for your age. In life you are faced with choices and in the future you need to make the right choice.”

Sohail, of Cargate Walk, Manchester, was also ordered to complete 200 hours unpaid work and 10 days of rehabilitation activity requirements.