DRUG smuggler who attempted to bring £135,000 worth of cocaine through Gatwick Airport in bottles of liqueur

DRUG smuggler who attempted to bring £135,000 worth of cocaine through Gatwick Airport in bottles of liqueur has been jailed for more than six years.

Patrick Alexander, 47, from Brixton, was arrested by UK Border Agency officers at Gatwick Airport's South Terminal on February 23 after he arrived on a flight from St Lucia.

Inside his suitcase officers found two bottles of cream liqueurs. When the liquid inside the bottles was tested it was found to contain cocaine. Further tests revealed that there was approximately one kilo of cocaine dissolved in the liquid. The cocaine was 100 per cent pure, and had an estimated street value of £135,000.

Alexander admitted attempting to import a controlled drug during a hearing at Croydon Crown Court on Thursday, May 5, and was jailed for six-and-a-half years.


He was also given a two-year travel restriction order, which will prevent him from leaving the country.

UK Border Agency assistant director Peter Avery said: "The drugs discovered here were of an extremely high purity, and I have no doubt that had Alexander not been stopped they would've ended up being sold on the streets of London.