Cannabis smuggler knows most of his drugs mules ‘will get caught’

Asked if he felt people were preying on his desperation, he said: “Not really. I didn’t have much choice or time, so I was offered a way out and took it.”

Zee said he also recruited “fresh faces, people you wouldn’t suspect – backpacker types. Not girls though: girls are too emotional.”

Many traffickers have used young women to bring back cannabis from Thailand, however, leading to a string of arrests.

They include 19-year-old Bella Culley, from Teesside, who was caught and jailed in Georgia with 12kg of marijuana and 2kg of hashish bound for the UK.

She was released from prison in November after accepting a plea bargain.

She claimed she had been coerced and tortured into smuggling the drugs.

The 28 tonnes seized by the NCA included 19 tonnes at Heathrow, where officers made 530 arrests, and about five tonnes at Manchester, where 145 suspected “mules” were detained.

Couriers are often told they will get away with a fine or a suspended prison sentence if they are caught but Ministry of Justice figures show that, in the year to June 2025, 80% of the 840 people sentenced for importing a Class B drug were jailed.

The number of people sentenced had risen from 209 in the previous 12 months.

Tightened security at airports has left traffickers looking for alternative smuggling methods, the BBC understands, with the post considered a viable option.

Zee said: “I’ve brought in 10 kees (kilos) a time in vacuum-packed parcels. Ten addresses, a kilo to each address. I just pay someone to take delivery – usually in weed as they’re happy with that.”

Thai and British authorities have clamped down on postal deliveries, though.

Zee said traffickers had responded by turning to shipping instead.

He showed the BBC pictures of cans of popcorn in which he said he had concealed 250g of drugs and shipped them to the UK before Christmas.

Zee said the cannabis he imports is broken down by dealers who often sell it in 3.5g deals – what’s known on the street as an “eighth” (of an ounce) – using glossy packaging bought online.