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Police managed to reach Leon Atkinson by tracking down a photo of him that he had sent through a secret messaging app used by gang members.
The leader of a major cocaine-trafficking gang has been arrested in England by tracking down a picture he posted of himself on a messaging app while drinking beer.
Leon Atkinson leads a gang involved in drug operations worth more than 11 billion dollars in just three months, according to Greater Manchester Police in England.
Atkinson, 41, was arrested after police tracked down messages through the encrypted Inkrochat network used by the gang members.
A Manchester court sentenced Atkinson to 15 years in prison. Atkinson and four others have pleaded guilty to a number of crimes, including planning to bring in Class A narcotics, as well as involvement in money laundering.
The gang’s plan was exposed after members of the secret police managed to infiltrate the communication network as part of a security operation that took the name Finitec.
Atkinson was identified as the gang leader when he sent a picture of him taken from his garden during the first lockdown in England due to the Corona epidemic in 2020. Atkinson had sent the picture to a fellow gang member.
picture released, GREATER MANCHESTER POLICE
Leon Atkinson was convicted of a series of drug offenses
The disclosure of the secret messaging network revealed how Atkinson and his fellow gang members coordinated the purchase and transportation of large quantities of cocaine with a 46-year-old member of another gang, Abdul Ghaffar.
The operation revealed that two members of the gang; One of them, Adam, aged 37, and Paul, aged 31, traded more than 40 kilograms of cocaine between them.
“This gang was using very advanced methods and they succeeded in distributing large quantities of cocaine,” said Roger Smithhurst, chief of investigations at Greater Manchester Police.