The Thug Life in Ipswich, County lines

Ipswich, is the county town of Suffolk on the East of the UK.

Situated on the estuary of the River Orwell, the town’s industry has now faded away and the port area is now used for leisure and housing, it has the University of Suffolk nearby, founded in 2016, the UK’s newest university.  

The Cornhill is the historic town square ion the Central area of Ipswich with the main shopping area.

Ipswich has good transport links, making it popular for commuters for affordable housing and countryside.London can be reached in just over an hour, there are two train stations, with direct links to all major local towns and cities. The local football team are called the tractor boys and the police force of Ipswich has its own tractor in police livery. The two major roads to and from the city are often congested and the A12 has been said to be the most dangerous road in the UK.

The actual town of Ipswich is divided into five postal code zones, these postcode zones coming into use in the 1970s., the central Ipswich postcodes being IP 1-5.

Youth offending has been very much on the rise during over the whole of the UK in recent years. It is difficult to give simple reasons for this. Knife crime is used to settle disputes today whereas in the past it would have been a fistfight or a non lethal weapon. Offences in the UK involving a knife were 25,000 in 2014, and up to 40,000 in 2018.

The drugs trade has been mainly responsible for the upsurge in knife crime, with gangs of youths living in an area dealing in drugs and identifying with their postcode. This has resulted in young people being often too afraid to leave their post code as it is the only area where they feel safe as there are people that will protect them nearby.

There is a lot of anti-social behaviour in Ipswich, as in most UK towns and you have to be careful if you are young and having a night out in the town centre. 

A university student called Yusuf  who lived in the town said 

“There are a lot of , well let’s call them ‘low status’ youths that sometimes cause trouble. 

They are selectively against anyone who isn’t like them. They are indifferent to the Chinese, and other far Eastern people. They quite like Afro-Caribean’s and other ethnic groups who copy them. They don’t like Eastern Europeans and people from India who they see as taking their jobs and houses!

be careful if you happen to be a Goth or a metalhead or speak ‘posh’ because you will not be popular with those ‘gangbangers’ in Ipswich”.

I first became aware of ‘County Lines’ drug dealing from an article by Katie Glass called ‘The Lost Boys’ in the Sunday Times supplement some time during 2017. Suffolk Police first became aware of this new type of drug dealing in 2013.

Before County Lines drug trading, the local drugs market was composed mainly of local user/dealers who, typically, travelled to a city to buy drugs for themselves and their friends and associates who they sold to. In Ipswich the police were so effective that they arrested these local drug dealers and this opened a void where there were no drugs available locally but there was still a demand for them. It was then groups of people came into Ipswich from London, using children as drug runners.

Such groups were also coming into other local towns in the East Anglian area selling Class A drugs, usually crack cocaine and heroin.

 A Suffolk Constabulary threat assessment initiated in 2014 observed that the supply of Class A Drugs to Ipswich and other Suffolk towns was dominated by street gangs from London, while locals were doing the actual street selling. The nature of this activity caused disputes with other gang members and local drug dealers over market share and hence many violent incidents were beginning to be recorded. This process was going on all over the UK which resulted in children and young people being trafficked across the UK as drug gangs tried to secure markets. 

The drugs coming from London were usually hidden in luggage or taped to the bodies of the ‘Youngers’ who transport them from London on public transport. Another method  being secreting the drugs in the body orifices of the young people. This latter method, ‘plugging’, makes the trafficking more secure since the police have neither the equipment nor the powers to detect or detain these ‘mules’.

Having a lot of runners mean that the police seldom find large amounts of drugs and the ‘drug hauls’, when they occur, involve fairly small amounts. The couriers do this because if they are apprehended they will only lose an amount they can afford to lose. This is an economic calculation designed to minimise the loss of the commodity and maximise profit. It is also a way of avoiding a long prison sentence. 

couriers would bring enough to supply the market for one or two days and then other couriers would bring up fresh supplies. The drug supply in County Lines uses the ‘Just in Time’ method so that no large batches are risked.

The dealers with the larger ‘stashes’ tended to be ‘resident Suffolk suppliers’ with no connection to County Lines, who tend to deal in cocaine and amphetamine, rather than crack and heroin.

The gangs use children and younger adolescents because they are easier to control and, being young and having few, or no, previous convictions,(Clean skins) are less likely to known to the police. 

At the outset the runners may be given relatively small amounts of money or presents; ‘phones or expensive trainers, for doing this ‘work’ but often the youngsters are just happy to be part of a gang, to be part of something. It is thought that the ‘Youngers’ join the gang not just for the financial rewards which may not be great, but it gives them a feeling of worth and belonging and even security.

They may be told that they have been specially chosen to play an important role in the gang, but gang members will sometimes arrange for these youngsters to be robbed of the drugs they are carrying so that they become indebted to them. If they protest, they are told that unless they keep working to pay off the debt both they and their families will be subject to violent retribution. These ‘youngers’ will be aged between 12 and 17 as a general rule.

Once in Ipswich the drugs are usually delivered by the runners to a residence taken over by IP1 or IP3 the main gangs in Ipswich, more of which later. 

Youngers from London or Ipswich are left in the “Trap House” to package up drugs, keep the tenant under control and collect the money. This arrangement appears to be overseen by older gang members called ‘elders’ from the Londongangs.

 Evidence from the police and housing professionals suggests that the London Elders may be staying in a separate house or flat belonging to a vulnerable young woman with whom they have deliberately struck up a relationship, while trusted Youngers operate and manage the ‘cuckooed’ flats or trap houses belonging to a local Class A drug addict who is paid in drugs for the use of their homes or subjected to threats or violence to make it available. Thus if there is a police raid, the elders are not to be found with the drugs.

The drugs are packaged for sale and the Youngers and other drug users are sent off to deliver the drugs to end users and collect money from them. 

The Youngers who deliver the drugs to the end-users run four different kinds of risk.

 The first risk is that they might be apprehended by the police,

 the second that they might be attacked and robbed by members of a rival gang,

 the third, that they might be attacked and robbed by their ‘customer’ 

fourth, that they might be robbed on the orders of Elders from their own gang. 

In each case they would be held responsible for the loss and could then be subject to violent retribution from the Elders, or other Youngers directed by the Elders to give out punishments.

These local dealing networks rely heavily on mobile phones to advertise drug sales, with group texts being sent directly to users for marketing purposes with messages such as; 

‘Open for bis’, ‘were on’, ‘Come n git it’

There are two main gangs in Ipswich. But be aware that there are those that argue that they are not gangs but a group of friends that have grown up with each other in the same area, which may well be true, but if they start dealing in drugs, they become a gang. 

Bedfordshire Police have given this definition of a gang: A gang is usually considered to be a group of people who spend time in public places, that see themselves (and are seen by others) as a noticeable group, and. engage in a range of criminal activity (such as carrying weapons and dealing drugs) .

So, whether these groups that live in Ipswich can be defined as gangs is open to semantics.

The two gangs in Ipswich are J-Block that operate from the IP1 postcode of Ipswich,

And Neno, or ‘The Three’ or ‘Nacton’ that operate from the IP3 post code. These two gangs tick all the boxes relating to gang definitions that are commonly given.

J-Block are named after Jubliee park which  is unknown to most people that live in Ipswich. The park was built in 1977 to celebrate the Queen’s jubilee.

It isn’t really a park, more a children’s play area. Some of the locals used it as a dump for unwanted items, broken glass, dogs mess it is not the sort of place you would want your child to play. In the evening teenagers would hang around the park. 

The Park has recently had a make - over and has been renamed Maple Park in an attempt to rebrand it after bad publicity. There are CCTV cameras watching over the park that have now been installed.

 The IP1 postcode has the Chantry, Whitton, Westbourne and Castle Hill areas within its scope. This is the ‘home turf’ of  the J-Block gang.

Nemo, aka ‘The Three’ operate from the Ravenswood, Proiry Heath and Gainsborough areas all making up the postcode IP3. They are said to operate from the Nacton Road area which leads to the upmarket village of Nacton. 

Both gangs in Ipswich have been boosted by the arrival of new members from London looking to work with established local drug dealing networks who know the area. Both groups have family or friendship links with London gangs who are supplying them.

The J-Block gang are composed mainly of white, African Caribbean and mixed race heritage young people.

The Neno gang is mainly black and South Asian young people.

Estimates of the numbers of core members of these gangs (excluding Youngers) range between 15 and 40 gang members for each gang.

Gang members would take orders over the phone and deliveries would be made by gang ‘Youngers’ on bikes or mopeds. The ‘Youngers’ tended to be the ones who had face-to-face contact with customers while the ‘Elders’ assumed a lower profile, dealing with the drug wholesalers.

The Neno gang had been operating a drugs business, supplying Ipswich and also selling in Stowmarket and Wickham both about 20 minutes away. Although the local gangs usually supply their own areas, they will branch out to areas nearby where there is no competition. 

The current situation in the UK is that if there is a local gang that has a substantial market to service, a big city gang will integrate with the local gang and depending on circumstances will integrate or takeover the local gang.

J-Block were also operating a drug dealing business probably not as successfully as Neno but they were also benefitting from ‘Country Lines’ supplies from a London gangs and two of their gang members were from London having links with London gangs. 

Drug related violence was being encouraged by London drugs gangs trying to expand their markets, Trains leaving Liverpool Street station stopping at Chelmsford, Colchester, Ipswich and Norwich were used by several London gangs trying to muscle in on this route to run their ‘County Lines’ operations which involved threats, violence and vulnerable children and young people acting as ‘runners’ to deliver drugs and bring back money to the gangs.

The University of Suffolk who were preparing a study on drug use in Ipswich and concentrated their study on the Jubilee Park area, which they described as an area with high levels of social deprivation, being in the bottom 10% of the most deprived districts in England.

The University report went on that  it is  said to be the ‘stamping ground’ of J Block a recently established local street gang with connections into drug distribution networks run by older people. The report said that J-Block uses an estimated 15-20 boys and girls below the age of 18 who are involved in the illegal activities in the area, most of whom are known to, or are involved with, welfare services. Local authority professionals believe that five or six of the girls in the area, aged between 12 and 18, may be at risk of sexual exploitation. The report also said that addicts' homes were being taken over (cuckooed)as bases for drug dealers in the area of J-Block the IP1 postcode.

Intelligence from the police also suggested the gangs were storing weapons at dealing locations and arming their runners with knives.

The study also discovered that other parts of Suffolk where the drug market was saturated was causing conflicts between the gangs and leading to violence.

The London gangs saw Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk as a lucrative area to exploit for their dealing and gangs from several areas were trying to establish links with the areas often working with the local gangs (or groups of friends if you prefer) to increase market share and maximise profits from drug dealing. 

Gangs from Hackney and Islington from the Kerridge Court Estate and the Finsbury park areas as well as South London gangs from the Croydon area have been given prison sentences for drug offences in East Anglia which includes both Norwich and Ipswich in its area. 

It was suspected that other areas had gangs carrying out County Lines business in particular Haringey, Brent and gangs from the South of London from Lambeth and Southwark.

The first death attributed to County Lines was the murder of Steve Stannard in 2016. His flat was being ‘cuckooed’ by a drug dealer runner for the gang. It seems that Stannard stole some heroin and  Hassiem Baqir, the runner, stabbed him to death. 

Baqir was being paid £100 a day to sell drugs. After the murder Baqir went to the cinema! 

It seemed that Stannard thought it would be a free source of heroin if he let 19 year old Hassiem Baqir stay at his flat and use it as a drug dealing base, but the arrangement only lasted five days until Stannard was macheted to death, costing Baqir 20 years in jail.

The Stannard murder caused the police to set up ‘Operation Gravity’ which opened their eyes to County Lines and the amount of violence it caused, with addicts being stabbed over drug debts for as little as £10! 

Knife crimes had increased almost 300% in Norfolk.

The police found that gang members were flooding into Suffolk and Norfolk, mainly children and youths arriving by train, but these children would be backed up by gangs if necessary.

 Many of the gangs were multi-ethnic, the gangs named after the Estates in London where they grew up.

 The local gangs in East Anglia began working with the gangs to sell drugs: weed, cocaine, crack and heroin. 

The local gangs began to copy the perceived life styles of the London gangs as the London gangs were piggy-backing the local gangs to tap into their customers.

Back in Ipswich, the police realised that the J-Block and Neno gangs had emerged as recognisable street gangs during 2016.

Police thought that these gangs were effectively ‘stage-managed’ by established local ‘crime families’ and run, day-to-day, by seven or eight older adolescents, ‘Elders’, aged between 18 and 25. It’s estimated by the agencies involved in face to face work with young people in these areas that the number of identifiable ‘gang members’ is up to 100 in 2016, although the actual number may be considerably more. 

There was a bitter rivalry between the JBlock gang from the Jubilee Park area of Ipswich and the Neno gang, from the Nacton area of Ipswich continued and they continued to taunt each other through videos posted on Youtube. It is not sure why this rivalry between the gangs turned into hatred, there are stories involving unpaid drug debts, although the initial dispute was said to be over girlfriends that had gone out with boys from both gangs.

It should be noted here that females as young as 12 had become trophies for the gangs. The girls had been made to carry or hide, weapons, drugs and money. They were also used for sexual gratification by the gangs often being forced to have multiple partners.

J-Block gang members Aristote Yenge (Gio), Kyreis Davies (Youngz) and Issac Calver (Flex) posted their videos on Youtube and Soundcloud and other social media as the trap music collective YTBYTN (Young Trap Boyz, Young Trap Noize) and they achieved a fair level of success in Ipswich amongst the pre-teen population. 

They were said to be well known in playgrounds in the Suffolk area. Their songs were all about Thug life, Drug dealing, country lines and the like. One of their better known tunes is called ‘I founda plug’ which is about concealing drugs inside the lower half of the body, ‘plugging’, this was alledgely the tune best known by the children of Ipswich. YTBYTN performed their Grime/Trap music at a local pub called ‘The Swan’.

The lyrics of grime music caused violence. There was an instance when a group of people affiliated to J-Block surrounded a Neno grime artist and made him say ‘Fuck Nacton, Fuck Neno, Fuck the three’.

He was then beaten and slashed with a knife, this public humiliation was filmed and uploaded to social media.

This cause a series of escalating tit for tat confrontations involving gang elders which esculated causing shots fired into a house and a firebombing during March 2017.

After continuing violence, including a number of stabbings, the bleak, whiney, synth  music was taken off social media in 2018 as it was said to glamorise the ‘gang lifestyle’. But as from the summer of 2020 it was posted back, so you can listen to it and judge if it glamorises anything.

 I found some of the comments amusing about the YTBYTN J-Block collective suggesting that they looked like a bunch of ‘failed Harry Potter film extras’. Claver, known as Flex, was described as looking like a scarecrow which was a fair observation as he was stick thin with massive hair.

J-Block members who came from the IP1 postcode can be seen in the videos making gestures with their hands, showing the number three by holding up three fingers on one hand and then making the shape of a gun with the other hand. This was taunting their rival gang from IP3 postcode the Neno gang.

Another J-Block YTBYTN video is called ‘23’, according to those able to deconstruct the symbolism it is about ‘scoring points’ for wounding those in rival gangs as if violence is a game. Number 23 refers to the basketball player Michael Jordan who wore the number 23 shirt and always scored a lot of points, he is a player that never misses. 

Also in the song are the lyrics ‘riding dirty, never clean’ this means that they always carry drugs and weapons.

Experts liken it to video games such as ‘Call of duty’ where points are scored for killing people, these gang members think that their lives are like a video game.

The Neno gang were making their own videos on social media which also have quite good viewing figures. They posted their tunes under the name DaRealSideOfIpps.

The videos almost mirror those of  YTBYTN, being about ‘thug-life’ drugs and again making gun signs towards one finger being held up, referring to J-Block. There are also videos of Neno spraying their tag in rival J-Block territory. The videos made by both gangs are provocative.

 Mark Straw who works for Ipswich Youth services argued that the music put up by the two gangs allowed them to express themselves and helped support and celebrate the youth sub-culture of the town! Straw arguing that those making the videos have got talent and skills to make their own beats, these guys have ideas, innovation and an entrepreneurial outlook on life! Straw saying that some of the tunes they have made are beautiful.

Dr Paul Andell of the University of Suffolk and experienced Youth worker, does not seem to agree saying that trap music videos give a distorted reality and they are a method of ‘myth-making’ for gang culture and wannabe gangsters singing about their lives, this can be dangerous because they get immersed in their make believe reality and will do anything for their reputation. The Trap music encourages violence as those that spend time listening to it will be affected by the messages it broadcasts.

There is a perceived glamour of being a drug dealer to some groups in society. Being a drug dealer gives a chance to be ‘someone’, a chance to make money, be part of a larger family (the gang). For some socially excluded groups becoming a footballer, a boxer or a drug dealer promises a glamour and money, drug dealing may be the realistic route for most who can’t see much of a future for themselves.

It wasn’t just financial gain as a motive for joining a gang, it was the kudos, the respect. But those that join a gang do seem to change in character, you are expected to act in a certain way and think in a certain way, even the clothes worn are subject to gang approval like some sort of uniform.

The videos made by the two Ipswich gangs seemed to want to show the so-called glamour of being a dealer, wearing designer clothes, clowning around with the rest of the gang, holding out wads of money to the camera, showing that their lives are sweet. 

In social media photographs the IP3 gang seem to have perfected the technique of having a photograph taken just as a puff of weed smoke hides their face ringing to mind the expression of ‘smoke and mirrors’ to hide the truth of their lives.

The Suffolk police reacted to country line infiltration and the increase in drug gang violence after The shooting and firebombing in the Nacton area by setting up a Youth Gang Prevention Unit in the same month, March 2017. The objective being to attempt to steer vulnerable youth away from crime. Attempts to get members of J-Block and Neno to leave the ‘Thug-life’ were not successful.

There was a confrontation between J-Block and Neno gangs on Saturday June 2.nd 2018. During the late morning J-Block members Yenge (Gio) and Davis (Youngze) were walking down the High Street in Central Ipswich when they spotted two members of Neno who immediately ran towards them, Yenge and Davis decided to run, to get away.

Yenge and Davis sought to hide in the cosmetic shop Lush to avoid the Neno gang members,. But it didn’t work and the Neno gang members came into the shop shouting ‘IP3’, ‘IP3’, the staff and those shopping must have been wondering what was going on, young girls in the shop buying bath bombs and cosmetics  were said to be terrified. 

Fortunatley a plain clothes policeman was nearby, and he forced the Neno members to leave the shop and as a result Yenge and Davis were able to escape while the plain clothes officer carried out a search of the Neno members.

This was humiliation for Yenge and Davis who liked to think of themselves as fearless J-Block gang members who sang about always standing their ground and Ipswich Town Centre was considered as J-Block territory. 

They had tried to justify running away by saying that they were carrying drugs and couldn’t afford to get caught in a city centre fight, but nobody was buying that excuse.

There was only one way for J-Block to save face and that was to strike back on Neno territory. When Yenge and Davis had got back to a safe place, they phoned ‘Snipes’ , who seemed to be leading the J-Block gang, and they started planning a raid in Neno territory.

London gang member  Adebayo Amusa aka Snipes who had links with drug gangs in Barking, London was on County Lines business in Ipswich. 

Snipes was cuckooing a flat near the football ground and had made an alliance with J-Block. 

Snipes knew a pliable drug customer who had a van they could use. The driver called Leon Glasgow was offered some drugs and cash to drive the J-Block gang around Neno territory looking for a rival gang member to take revenge.

They arranged to meet with Glasgow at Alderman Park. Yenge got into the front seat, Snipes, Davis and Isaac Calver (Flex) got into the back. They also had a gang member, nineteen year old Callum Plaats, aka Chico, riding a bicycle he was acting as a spotter, looking for anyone with Neno connections, another 16 year old boy was cycling acting as a spotter with Plaats..

Tavis Spencer Aitkens was born on 2.nd Feb 2001 in Ipswich. On the 2.nd June he had been working with a friend installing a car engine. Tavis was doing an apprenticeship as a motor mechanic at his uncle’s garage. In the afternoon he was making his way back to his father’s house. 

Tavis was a member of the Neno gang and had been in videos posted on Youtube where he was making gun signs at a single finger being held up, symbolising IP1, J-Block gang. 

Tavis had been approached by the police working for the Youth Services in Ipswich to try to persuade Tavis to cut his links with the Neno gang, but he had told them to F-Off. 

It was later said that Tavis appeared in the video because he was tall and looked good but was not deeply into the gang, however he was perceived by J-Block as being a Neno gang member. There is some dispute how deeply involved Tavis, aka Biggz’ was in the gang, his social media posts show that he seemed to adopt the gang lifestyle. 

However, Tavis was popular and seemed to have a promising future and it was thought/hoped that he would outgrow the gang lifestyle. Tavis was hoping to visit Jamacia when he was 18.

Tavis was walking past a parade of shops in Queens Way in the middle of Neno territory. This was the same parade of shops where Yenge had been convicted for fighting in 2016 and Tavis was one of the people that he had attacked when J-Block had organised a raid with baseball bats and machetes. Tavis had also been arrested during the fight, when he would have been aged 15, but was released after CCTV showed he was just defending himself.

The van stopped next to Tavis and the gang got out of the van as Tavis ran off and he managed to reach Packard Avenue near to where he lived, but he was seen to slip as the gang jumped on him and blows rained down on him, one of the gang was stabbing him, it was never definetly proved who did the stabbing. The attack took about a minute and Tavis was stabbed fifteen times.

The witness to the attack said the gang ran off as Tavis tried to get back on his feet, but one of the J-Block gang came back to smash a wine bottle on Tavis’s head causing the bottle to shatter.

Somehow, Tavis managed to stagger back to his father’s home where he fell in front of his Step-mother and step sister who called the emergency services. When the step sister Candice Sobers asked him who did it, Tavis said “J-Block man”.

Tavis was losing too much blood, there were so many wounds. When the para-medics arrived they had to perform emergency surgery but it was no use and Tavis was pronounced dead at the hospital. A tragic and senseless death over some macho hurt feelings, Tavis had nothing to do with the incident that triggered the attack.

As J-Block made their escape, the van that they travelled in was seen to stop near a towpath of the river Gipping. 

A group of youngsters were seen leaving the van and  walking down the towpath by people in nearby flats watching them and throw something shiny reflecting the sun into the middle of the river, near some water lilies, which was fortunate as it gave the police a marker as where to search.

 When the police learnt of this sighting some days later, they sent in their frogmen and searched the spot. After sifting through the debris thrown into the river for a few hours they found a knife with an 8 inch blade on 10thJune. Tests on the knife proved it was the knife used to murder Tavis.

The police had been quick to identify the van, recover it and conduct forensic tests to ascertain who had been inside. Yenge, Davis and Calver were arrested on 4th June, Plaats, the cyclist, was pulled in on the 6th June. It was on 24th July that Adebayo Amusa, aka Snipes was tracked down to his Trap house near the Ipswich football ground at Great Gipping Street. It was Snipes’s DNA found on the bottle that was smashed on Tavis’s head.

The trial started in November 2018, Judge Martyn Levett lifted an order banning identification of Davies/Youngze who was still aged under 18. All of the suspects pleaded not guilty and denied being in the van when Tavis was attacked. 

Fortunately, the van driver, Leon Glasgow, who knew nothing of the plans for an attack, he thought he was just making another drug delivery as he had done in the past for a £50 pay off. 

He had not bought the van he usually drove. Instead, he used the van of a work colleague because he had the use of it, and it was nearer.

This switch in the use of vans was fortunate in that It undermined the J-Block  gang’s claim that any DNA found in the van had been because they had been in the van previously. This excuse was now ruled out. 

Leon Glasgow had not seen who got into the back of the van, or so he claimed, but he said that Yenge sat in the front of the van with a mysterious man called ‘M’ who was probably an invented character designed to take the blame for the murder.

 Leon Glasgow being forced to go along with the story of the mysterious man who almost certainally did not exist.

 Glasgow said that Snipes had paid him off and got in the back of the van with some others but he could only hear voices. Snipes tried to claim that although he had paid off Glasgow he did not get into the van, but his fingerprints were found there. The J-Block gang just lied and lied.

Following the attack, Glasgow said he was worried as he had seen Yenge’s blood splattered clothing as he got into the van with M, he realised that something serious had taken place and he was now involved. 

Yenge must have regretted his descision to sit in the front of the van as he was wearing a distinctive top which was picked up on CCTV as the van cruised around looking for Neno gang members to attack. Yenge had tried to claim that he had left the van, leaving his distinctive top behind before the attack but no one was buying that story.

It seemed that the J-Block gang felt that they could carry out a cowardly attack in the middle of the day on a residential street and assume that nobody would speak out against them. Those that did act as witnesses were promised anonymity. I suppose that locals were not prepared to put up with  any retribution from the gang if they spoke against them so it was easier for them to keep quiet.

Although the J-Block gang members were on remand, they could still contact gang members on the outside and carry out the gangs ‘no grassing’ policy by intimidating or harming adverse witnesses, their property or family members. Snipes had a smuggled phone on him while he was on remand and was issuing instructions to gang members before the trial which I would assume would include witness intimidation. If people spoke out against the gang they may have a brick thrown through a window or their car tyres slashed.

Witness intimidation is widespread, I have attended trials and have been questioned when taking notes it has been thought that I have been trying to obtain details about witnesses to pass onto others. You are supposed to ask the judge permission to take notes in court, although this is a grey area legally.  

The J-Block gang had a couple of days to get their alibis and stories straight before their arrests, but they turned on each other when they realised that their story was not going to work.

 Firstly, trying to put all the blame on Yenge who had been positively id’d and the fictious ‘M’ ; and then they started to blame each other, although forensics put them all in the van, members of the gang tried to explain that they had got out before the attack on Tavis, (although they were not picked up on CCTV). It would appear that they would all be guilty of murder due to joint enterprise.

During the court case the J-Block gang were all turning on each other, blaming each other for the events leading to the death of Tavis. At one point everyone had to leave the court as Yenge, who described himself as a musician, and Callum Plaats started fighting each other in court.

The two J-Block gang members that had come from London to set up the County Lines business seem to have been the two most violent gang members, these were Yenge (Gio) and Amusa (Snipes) both of whom claimed that they started dealing in drugs when they were 13 years of age.

Davis (Youngze) tried to argue that he too had been dealing in drugs since the age of 13, living and working in a Trap house. He was trying to get sympathy and distance himself from the murder; however, he was still putting on a gangster act and never said that he was scared or regretted his role in the gang.

 What Davis was trying to hide was that he had his own drug dealing side line going on when he was selling in Colchester were his mother lived. 

Although under 18, Davis was very provocative in the videos put on Youtube and it was he and Yenge who had asked for the attack on Neno territory when Tavis was killed.(later it was revealed that Davis and Tavis had been in the same class at Infant school).

Leon Glasgow’s evidence continued to be damming for the defendants. He said of the occupants in the van he was driving after the death of Tavis

 “No-one seemed worried, no-one said they didn’t want to be there, no-one said it was dreadful.They were proud of what they’d done and were jubilant about it afterwards and appeared to be proud and pleased.

The Trial went on for four months, imagine the cost of that trial, it must have been millions of pounds that could have been spent on Youth work in Ipswich!

 In March 2019 four of the gang were found guilty. Plaats who was the spotter on the bicycle was found guilty of manslaughter, his barrister said that he suffered from ADHD, had asbergers syndrome, poor concentration  and a low IQ. He was sentenced to 14 years.

Issac Calver (Flex).

Aristote Yenge (Gio)

Adebayo Amusa (Snipes)

And Kyreis Davies (Youngze)

Were all found equally guilty of murder. 

Issac Calver burst into tears but none of them showed any remorse or apologised for their actions. 

Instaed while being sentenced  they laughed and joked with each other in the dock

Davies was sentenced to a minimum of 21 years (reduced to 16 years on appeal).

Calver got 21 years, Amusa 23 years and Yenge 25 years.

After the court case there was much public debate and demands to clear the streets of gangs dealing. ‘Where there is a will there is a way’. But there were similar demands to clear the streets of prostitution after the Ipswich murders in 2006 when five women sex workers were murdered after selling themselves for drug money. The red light area being around Portman road, where the Ipswich Town FC ground is located.

There was a lot of money spent on initiatives set up to combat the problem of street prostitution after 2006. One organisation that was set up was called ICENI which was committed to helping women cope with their addictions and stop working on the streets. There was some success, and it was very beneficial for some women; but many said that it just pushed the problem away from the area, it was said that although there were fewer women on the streets, the business was pushed indoors and the women work online. The schemes were also very expensive during a time of austerity when council’s were being forced to cut spending.

To combat the problem of county lines, drug selling gangs, People were asking for more help for disaffected youth in Ipswich, more provision and heavier sentences for weapon carrying but it seemed it would be a very difficult job to dissuade young people to quit the ‘Thug life’. How much help could be given for each person?

The Police were being given new powers, The Offensive Weapons Act, 2019 gave police extra powers to seize weapons. Modern Slavery legislation was being used against those found using children as ‘runners’ in the county lines business. (This causing problems of defining when a victim turns into an offender)

It was argued that many of those involved in County Lines have been damaged from a young age and many have mental health issues as a result. This would often require one-to-one support and those requiring treatment to want it. This again would be very very expensive.

There have also been huge cuts in spending on facilities for young people at the same time a Times newspaper report from 2018 said that 30,000 children between the ages of 10 and 15 are thought to be ‘gang’ members and 70,000 youths up to the age of 25 are in gangs so the problem is huge and thought to be growing.

Those children selling drugs can make much more money than in legal employment, There is a great deal of money to be made in the Ipswich drugs market. Some children were making £500 a week, a lot of money for not doing very much, it was going to be difficult trying to dissuade such people to turn away from the gangs.

It seemed that whenever a gang was cleared from the streets by police activity, another quickly filled the vacuum. Within weeks of the leaders of J-Block gang  being off the streets, another County Lines gang called ‘Rico and Frank’ appeared to service the J-Block area, having branched out from Colchester to run a new line in Ipswich.

This gang used classic County Lines tactics, cuckooing drug users flats in Colchester and Ipswich and getting them to work for the line. The runners were teenagers and one of these teenagers, a 17 year old, stabbed Daniel Saunders aged 32 to death in Turin Street Ipswich on Sunday 16th December 2018 using a 30 cm bladed knife which was plunged into Saunders stomach. 

It was said by his murderer that Saunders had tried to snatch drugs from him, to Saunders it must have seemed an easy move to take drugs from a spotty youth who looked as if he was bunking off school (he had actually been expelled), but it cost him his life as he bled out on the pavement.

 Saunders was a functioning addict, but also a father with a family left devastated by his death. 

The murderer could not be named due to his age at the time is now known to be Kieran Hayward who  was ‘cuckooing’ in Ipswich. He was helped by the rest of the gang to get out of Ipswich before being identified by the police.

Within four  days the police had tracked him down to a caravan site at Beach Road, St.Oysth owned by  the parents of one of the ‘Rico and Frank’ gang members. 

 During the four days that the police were searching for them, the gang had returned to Ipswich to threaten the man whose flat had been used as a base by the gang at Griffin Court, Wherstead Road, Ipswich to keep quiet or face consequences. 

At the conclusion of the six week trial, The murderer Kieran Haywood of Bury St.Edmunds was given a life sentence with a minimum of 19 years. His mother told of his rapid descent into the drug world after he was expelled from his school.

Five others were convicted:

Benjamin Gosbell, aged 20, of Gratian Close, Highwoods, Colchester. Sentenced to 30 months’ imprisonment.

Arjun Jadeja, aged 18, of The Nook, Wivenhoe. Sentenced to 30 months’ detention in a Young Offender Institution.(it was his parents that had the caravan site)

Kieran Elliott, aged 17, of Stanford Road, Colchester. Sentenced to an 18-month detention and training order.  

Olusola Durojaiye, aged 33, of Appleton Mews, Colchester. Sentenced to 12-months’ imprisonment suspended for two years, 250 hours unpaid work and a 15-day rehabilitation activity requirement. He was a local taxi driver who did driving jobs for the gang. 

A 16-year-old boy from Bury St Edmunds (who cannot be named for legal reasons), who was also convicted of assisting an offender.

So ended the ‘Rico and Frank’ line. I don’t know who has replaced this line now, but the Suffolk Constabulary internet site is one of the better police sites and will give details of the latest arrests and tell of the latest gangs and arrests in Ipswich. The J-Block gang is also thought to have reformed and become active in drug dealing again.

It should have been clear to the Neno gang that the police would be targeting them after arresting J-Block members. The gang was said to be led by Abbas Uddin a 25 year old who was living at Nansen road Ipswich and was arrested on June 29th 2018. The address was the same as Tavis Spencer Aitkens had been living before he was killed 27 days before. 

The Neno gang was not known to have murdered anyone but they had come lose with shootings and stabbings being reported to police.

After another court case, eight members of the Neno gang were jailed, all of them known to, or friends to Tavis Spencer Aitkens. They were found guilty of drug dealing, weapon possession, robbery and GBH.

Abbas Uddin, 26, was jailed for 15 years and eight months.

Jake Marsh, 18, was jailed for seven years and two months

Tyler Woodley, 18, was jailed for six years and 11 months

Haden Fraser, 19, four year and eight months

Jake Bristol, 47, was jailed for three years and seven months

Tawfiq O'Connor, 18, was jailed for four years

Lamar Dagnon, 22, was jailed for eight years and 10 months

Liam Roberts, 19, was jailed for four years.

This did not end the Neno gangs who are still operating although personnel changes as members are put in jail.

In September 2020, The London Metropolitan police gave figures that showed more than 200 Londoners linked to drugs gangs had been found in Suffolk in the previous 15 months. It was thought that there were possibly 30 County lines operating from London to Suffolk despite activity having been severely reduced during the coronavirus lockdown. Lines were now thought to be coming also from the Midlands and Liverpool.

I made a podcast on Country lines in October 2018 called ‘When country Lines go wrong’ when a South London gang set up a drugs line in Horsham, West Sussex so if you were interested in this podcast you might want to listen to the Horsham story when I was in court following that story, the incident in Ipswich was taking place.

Anyhow, so ends another podcast, thankyou for listening, Thankyou to Damselfly for the backing music and until next time. Goodbye