Police take £11.2m of illegal drugs off streets

A police force targeting serious and organised crime said they had confiscated drugs with a street value of £11.2m in 2023.

Cumbria Constabulary said they seized substances including heroin, cocaine and amphetamine, along with suspected criminal money worth more than £4m.

The force also shut down "numerous" industrial-sized cannabis farms in the last year, it said.

The action was part of Operation Alliance, which encompasses all the individual operations where officers targeted organised crime groups.

An additional £4.5m seized last year was also subject to criminal investigation, police added.

In 2022, police seized drugs with a street value of £4m and more than £1.5m across the county.

Det Supt Ian Hussey said: "The most important people in this is you: the public.

“To keep up the fight against this type of organised crime we need the public to let us know when they see anything suspicious in their communities.”

Cumbria’s Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner, Peter McCall, said: “Anyone who considers committing crime in the county will be pursued robustly and when caught they will face the consequences."

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