Drugs courier with £50,000 haul is jailed

A BUS mechanic caught with almost a kilo of cocaine in the car he was driving has been jailed for three years.

The High Court in Edinburgh yesterday heard that police stopped the red Vauxhall Astra on the M8 in West Lothian after a tip-off and found a package under the front passenger seat.

The cocaine could have fetched almost 50,000 on the streets, judge Lord Uist was told.

Liam Bell, 28, of Westhouses Road, Mayfield, Dalkeith, pleaded guilty to being concerned in the supply of the drug on 29 April last year.

Solicitor advocate Richard Goddard, defending, said Bell had agreed to become a courier on that day to pay off his own drug debt.

Jailing Bell, Lord Uist told him drug suppliers could not operate without people willing to act as couriers.