Operation Venetic: Crime group jailed over yacht cocaine and cannabis smuggling plots

An organised crime group who hatched an audacious plan to smuggle 600 kilos of cocaine on a yacht participating in a transatlantic sailing race, and imported more than half a tonne of cannabis, have been jailed for a total of more than 111 years.

Lee McClenaghan, 57, from Chelmsford, and his close associate, 55-year-old Lea Talbot from Chadwell St Mary, were investigated by the Organised Crime Partnership – a joint National Crime Agency and Metropolitan Police Service unit.

McClenaghan and Talbot used the encrypted communications platform EncroChat to discuss their offending, under the handles ‘catwithninelives’ and ‘legitimateyak’ respectively.

McClenaghan instigated the plot to sail the vessel in the race, an annual event which runs from St Lucia to Lagos in Portugal, and sent Talbot to meet with Venezuelan drug cartel bosses prior to the contest in 2020.

The pair spent two years planning the venture, only to see the race cancelled in May 2020 due to the Covid 19 pandemic. After that McClenaghan explored smuggling multi-tonne quantities of cocaine from South America hidden in shipping container loads of fresh fruit and vegetables, and large quantities of cannabis from Morocco.

McClenaghan employed Ian Magee, 68, and also from Chelmsford, to source and sail a yacht called the ‘Ocean Magic’ in the 2019 race in what investigators believe may have been a dummy run. Daniel Braithwaite, 61, from Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex, helped arrange prices and payments for the drugs.

Magee, and another man he employed due his sailing experience, purchased a vessel called the ‘Sotirius’, which they planned to load with the cocaine and enter in to the 2020 race.

Chelmsford Crown Court also heard that McClenaghan arranged two separate importations of cannabis to the UK, from Canada and South Africa, totalling 676 kilos. Investigators were also able to evidence links between the OCG and the two major cannabis importations.

In March 2022, whilst searching the inside of a machine lathe, Border Force officers at Tilbury Port found 408 kilos of the drug, which had come from South Africa.

McClenaghan was again the main driver behind this, assisted by Daniel Braithwaite and 61-year-old Paul Tozer, from Epping, Essex, whose textile business was to be the delivery address for the consignment. They were assisted by 52-year-old Karl Richter, from Swansea, who communicated with a South African contact, and worked with 60-year-old Kane Ward, from Upminster, Essex, who helped organise the planned importation. 

In July 2023, Border Force officers at Southampton examined a consignment of tool boxes imported from Vancouver. Within the load were 20 large tower toolboxes containing 268 kilos of cannabis.

This importation was assisted by Talbot and 41-year-old Stephen Persaud, from Upminster, Essex, a freight forwarder whose company managed loads into various ports, and 37-year-old Sundeep Grewal, from Grays, Essex, who operated a food business in Tilbury which was used a delivery address for the importation. They were again assisted by Paul Tozer.

John Campbell, 69, from London NW6, assisted by creating fraudulent payments to release the consignment and offered many services to criminals such as McClenaghan, including creating false companies.

McClenaghan, Talbot, Braithwaite, Magee, Campbell and Ward were jailed for 30 years, 23 years, 22 years, 20 years, 10 years and six years and six months respectively at Chelmsford Crown Court today (10 September), having either pled guilty or being convicted of drugs offences previously.

Richter is due to be sentenced on 16 October.

The OCP’s investigation formed part of Operation Venetic, the UK NCA-led law enforcement response to the takedown of the EncroChat service in June 2020.

Detective Inspector Richard Smith, from the Organised Crime Partnership, said: “The cocaine smuggling plan conceived by McClenaghan and Talbot was daring and would have been incredibly lucrative had it succeeded.

“Its failure deprived organised criminals of the profits this large amount of cocaine would have generated, and prevented communities suffering the violence and exploitation associated with it.

“Undeterred, this OCG diversified into importing huge quantities of cannabis, operations which McClenaghan controlled at every level. The work undertaken by the Organised Crime Partnership, along with the vigilance of Border Force officers at Tilbury and Southampton, stopped these smuggling attempts in their tracks.

“This case is yet another great example of the unique collaboration between the National Crime Agency and Metropolitan Police, with the Organised Crime Partnership protecting Londoners and communities across the UK from the scourge of drugs supply.”

The Organised Crime Partnership (formerly the Middle Market Drugs Partnership) has been in operation for 20 years and is comprised of equal numbers of specialist NCA officers and Metropolitan Police detectives.

The team works to stop the flow of drugs to the criminal market in London, target upstream criminals that impact on London, as well as disrupting those overseas that make huge profits from this illegal activity.