Drug squad police officers jailed after undercover sting

TWO elite police officers who were caught on a hidden camera taking and dealing cocaine during an undercover sting were jailed yesterday.

A total of three officers, who had all served on Britain's National Crime Squad, were trapped by the secret operation, one of whom ran a drugs den at the home he shared with his mistress.

Northampton Crown Court heard the group used the house, in Derbyshire, to take and share drugs with a serving prisoner and members of the public.

Judge Charles Wide QC passed sentence on all nine defendants, jailing Derbyshire police sergeant David Alan Redfern for three years and nine months.

Redfern, 42, of Dale End Road, Hilton, Derbyshire, had earlier pleaded guilty to charges of being concerned in the supply of cocaine, offering to supply cocaine, two counts of possessing cocaine and perverting the course of justice.

Sergeant Mark Jennison, 41, also of Derbyshire police, was handed a 12-month prison term after being convicted of two counts of possession of cocaine and one count of supplying cocaine.

Heather Bossart, 40, of Nottinghamshire police, who admitted a charge of possessing cocaine was sentenced to 100 hours community service.

Jennison and Bossart were both serving with the National Crime Squad at the time of their arrests in April 2001 and both gave addresses to the court as St Mary's Wharf police station, Derby.

Redfern served with the unit, set up to tackle drug trafficking and organised crime, between 1995 and 2000.

A police operation codenamed Operation Lancelot was launched into their activities in 2000, with a covert camera installed at the house in Hilton in December that year. The camera filmed Redfern and his partner Nicola Bladen, 36, in a domestic spat, rowing over who would feed a pet and who would chop lines of cocaine.

The court had also heard that on one occasion Jennison left his children outside the house in a car, while he went inside to snort a line of the drug.

Michael Pert QC, prosecuting said the camera and an attached microphone had recorded numerous conversations about the use of drugs.

David Jones, 38, a serving prisoner at HMP Ashwell, in Leicestershire, admitted a charge of possessing cocaine and was jailed for one day.

The court heard that Redfern, who had originally arrested him in 1997, had picked him up from the jail and driven him to Bladen's home.

"Jones had been arrested in 1997 by Redfern and sentenced to six and a half years in 1998 for drugs offences," said Mr Pert QC.

Redfern told police that he had maintained contact with Jones as he hoped to cultivate him as an informant.