SAS Catching the Criminals S01E06 (2024)
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00:00Covert surveillance, reconnaissance, deception, stealth, and disruption.
00:07These are the skills I learned on the military front line.
00:11And they can be used to combat a different enemy.
00:15Britain's criminals.
00:20That's the teams running to position now.
00:22My name is Billy Billingham.
00:24And I spent over 20 years in the SAS.
00:29Now I'm going to show you how SAS tactics are helping to crack down on anti-social crime across Britain.
00:37All teams now in position.
00:39Strike, strike, strike.
00:40Some enforcement agencies are already using SAS tactics to hunt criminals.
00:45Check this out. This is exactly what they were looking for.
00:49Hey presto.
00:51And I want to find out how much the police are doing too.
00:54Go, go, go.
00:57She's going to pick up a target right now.
00:59You're lying, aren't you? And you know very well it's illegal.
01:02Let's go. You need to move quick. Stand by.
01:04Banged up. Job done.
01:21As humans, we can't do everything.
01:23But there are some animals that can work faster and more efficiently.
01:28The police have a long history of working side by side with dogs, as we do in the SAS.
01:35And the results are often surprising and revealing.
01:43Illegal tobacco is big business.
01:46A chain from smuggling and counterfeiting down to high street sellers.
01:51Today, I'm with a team hoping to break that link with a suspected gang they've had under surveillance.
01:57So this morning we're in Devon and we're working with trading standards, the police and sniffer dogs.
02:02Combined operation. We're going after illegal tobacco trades.
02:06Hidden factories, hiding away.
02:08But with the use of the sniffer dogs, just like the old days in the military, we will find them.
02:16Morning everybody.
02:17Morning.
02:20Leading the briefing is a trading standards operative who cannot be identified for operational reasons.
02:26Good morning ladies and gentlemen.
02:28Thank you for offering to assist with today's operation, which is the latest phase of Op Alabaster.
02:33Today's raid is a reverse operation, a technique I've seen many times.
02:38They've already had one suspect in custody and searched his house and van.
02:43But now they want to build a bigger picture around him and his associates.
02:48He was arrested on suspicion of money laundering
02:51after a significant quantity of cash was found in his kitchen microwave.
02:55The rear of the van was found to contain approximately 2,100 packets of illegal cigarettes
03:00and 848 pouches of hand-rolling tobacco.
03:05It was a good haul, but to disrupt the whole network, they need more.
03:13Intel has led them to a large storage facility.
03:16They believe somewhere within that site is the gang's stash house.
03:21So the aim of today's operation is to identify the storage container
03:25through the assistance of Stuart Phillips, a BWI canine, and his SPACA detection dogs.
03:32Stuart's sniffer dogs are vital for an operation like this.
03:36With a phenomenal sense of smell, more than 10,000 times more powerful than a human,
03:41they can be trained to find anything from drugs and explosives to cash,
03:46even in the most unlikely of places.
03:50They will be a valuable tool today.
03:53Any questions?
03:55Just out of interest, where does this stuff come from?
03:57We've had intel that there may be a factory within the south-west that is producing the product.
04:02This is quite dangerous stuff as well, is it?
04:04Potentially, the counterfeit versions don't have the same quality controls,
04:07so it's really an unknown quantity.
04:09There could be high levels of lead,
04:11there could be all sorts of contaminants within counterfeit tobacco.
04:17The dangers are real.
04:19With no regulation, anything can be inside this illegal tobacco,
04:23and the health implications of smoking it can be devastating.
04:26And the fakes often look legitimate.
04:29Ben from Trading Standards is an expert.
04:33So how do you identify that that's illegal?
04:36So a lot of it is just because I've been doing it for such a long time.
04:39But there are brands that we will see,
04:41and they're always in the non-standardised packaging,
04:44so I know that that's going to be counterfeit.
04:46Other than that, I'm able to just spot certain things that they're missing off the labelling.
04:52How big is this crime?
04:53It's massive at the moment.
04:55So these groups are everywhere?
04:56Yeah, what we have to understand is that these aren't organised criminal groups
05:00just dealing in illegal tobacco or vapes.
05:03It is just another commodity that they are exploiting.
05:07This is a cycle.
05:08We want members of the public to realise that buying illegal tobacco
05:12just feeds into this piggy-banking and OCG.
05:16The money that they're spending on these illegal tobaccos
05:19goes directly into organised criminal groups.
05:23The hope is today's operation will stop this OCG in their tracks.
05:29The team deploy to the strike site in Convoy.
05:32It's a massive compound.
05:34One gated access point in and out.
05:39This is the team now at the forming up point
05:41and the entry point at the main gate there.
05:43They're going to try and gain access through a soft approach, if possible,
05:47and if not, then they'll make entry.
05:50You can open it, can you? That's great. OK.
05:54The owners of the site aren't involved
05:56and they are more than happy to help the police.
05:59Access made.
06:01This is a shared compound so basically whoever owns this rents out spaces
06:04and basically that's what's happened.
06:06These people have took advantage of that.
06:08As you can see, it's well secured with cameras
06:10so they feel it's a pretty safe space.
06:13Now inside, the search can begin.
06:16The site is around four acres.
06:18There's a lot of ground to cover.
06:20We've got three concentrations of storage containers.
06:23Two there, two further ones over there
06:25and then a row behind this bus here.
06:27The team start on foot, boots on the ground,
06:30but soon they will send in the dogs.
06:33There are six in the van, but they always work separately.
06:37One dog, one handler.
06:39There'll be no stone left unturned.
06:42Can this team canine find the contraband?
06:54In the SAS, surveillance can be key for catching out the enemy,
06:59but it's not just the police or trading standards
07:02that can help catch criminals.
07:09Dave McKelvie is managing director of a private investigation company.
07:14He and his team specialise in covert operations.
07:18To carry out surveillance, you've got to be trained.
07:21We're all ex-police officers, ex-detectives.
07:24We spent our lives investigating organised crime.
07:28Dave can't reveal all of his tools,
07:30but he's willing to speak about one of his customised vehicles,
07:34which is kitted out just like a military operation.
07:38This van's equipped with cameras in the roof,
07:41all round the sides, all hidden cameras.
07:44It's got a two-way radio system that we can talk to each other.
07:50Established with a view on the window.
07:53It's used as a command and control vehicle.
07:56It's got a drone in the back that we can use and we can see.
08:00It's got its own Wi-Fi system built in.
08:03So it's an all-in-one surveillance vehicle
08:06that gives us the ability to put this in anywhere
08:10and someone can sit in the back and monitor what's going on.
08:15Dave's team focus on counterfeit operations,
08:18but there is one particular case that stands out for him.
08:22The Border Agency at Stansted Airport
08:25had intercepted a quantity of counterfeit tobacco pouches,
08:29labelled and on their way to an address.
08:32It was down to Dave to set up an SAS-style sting.
08:36We viewed the packages, confirmed that it was all counterfeit.
08:40So what we did was we took photographs of the boxes
08:43and we dummied up those boxes.
08:45So we had three boxes identical to those that had been seized
08:50by the Border Agency.
08:52We weighed them down and then we carried out a delivery
08:56of those three fake boxes, if you like,
08:59our boxes, to an address in Romford.
09:03From that point on, Dave and his team
09:06did not want to let those boxes leave their site.
09:09They started covert surveillance.
09:11Within days, a hire van turned up,
09:15a chap got out of the vehicle, collected those boxes
09:18and other similar boxes that had been delivered by Royal Mail,
09:22put them into the van and off the van went.
09:25Dave and his team followed this vehicle from London across the UK
09:29to Sheffield and Birmingham,
09:31photographing the driver and his associates
09:34at every rendezvous point until the final stop.
09:38We watched some individuals who came out of the address
09:41unload boxes and bags, big bin liners, into this address.
09:47So at that point, we realised that there was the potential
09:51this was what we call a fulfilment house.
09:54A fulfilment house is a premises where they manufacture,
09:58the final stages of manufacture of fake tobacco.
10:02But Dave's company has no power to make entry without police
10:06and there was no time. The van made off.
10:09We split our surveillance team up.
10:11Half our team stayed on the address itself, waiting for police,
10:15and we followed the van into a car park
10:18and at that point, basically, there was a police car passing.
10:22We stopped the police car, explained what we were doing, who we were,
10:25and the police then pulled the van
10:28and in the rear of the van, there were boxes of counterfeit tobacco.
10:32The driver was immediately arrested.
10:35The next step in the operation was a raid with the police
10:38on the suspected fulfilment house.
10:40The address was literally full up.
10:43Every room was full of counterfeit tobacco in big laundry bags.
10:48The amount of tobacco in there
10:51and the sophistication of the production process.
10:54In 29 years of policing, I'd never seen, you know, something on this scale.
10:58Huge scale operation, making millions and millions of pounds.
11:02Huge.
11:04Raid completed, contraband confiscated,
11:07but the surveillance didn't end there.
11:10Dave and his team continued to follow vehicles
11:13and other suspects they'd seen at the first address.
11:16Further surveillance led to more raids, more seizures and more arrests.
11:22The impact of taking down this OCG has far-reaching consequences.
11:28The actual prosecution value was in excess of £10 million,
11:32but that's just from what we've seized.
11:35If you work on the basis that these individuals
11:38were operating week in, week out,
11:42you're talking about hundreds of millions of pounds
11:45of lost revenue to the taxpayer.
11:50Plus, with the fake tobacco, we found asbestos in it,
11:54we found rat droppings in it, poison, all sorts of stuff.
11:58And obviously the public then literally smoking, ingesting these poisons,
12:03asbestos, straightens their lungs.
12:06The public health risks are absolutely huge.
12:09It's really, really dangerous stuff.
12:12But through military-style intel-governing,
12:15working within police guidelines, Dave and his specialist team
12:19built a strong case against members of this OCG.
12:23We put the case, the evidence, all together,
12:26we prosecuted it, they were our lawyers,
12:29and we then gave evidence at court, and that then led to the conviction.
12:34Four of the principals involved in it were convicted
12:37of manufacturing and supplying this tobacco on a vast sale.
12:42The suspects are awaiting sentencing,
12:45but with 30 years of professional experience,
12:48Dave has no doubt as to what got his team the guilty verdict.
12:52Surveillance is absolutely vital in these cases
12:55because that's the stuff that gives you the evidence.
12:58We've got images of them and video footages of them
13:01moving the stuff between cars, between garages, houses.
13:05That's what convicted them.
13:14Back in Devon...
13:18..Stuart is ready to bring out his secret weapon.
13:22Right, who have we got here, then?
13:24We've got a few in here, tradie dogs,
13:26but we're going to use Griff now, the little springer.
13:29Griff, Griff, come. Come, boy.
13:32Good lad.
13:34Get a ball, just in case you need one.
13:38Right. Ready?
13:41Ready? Come on.
13:52Griff is a springer spaniel,
13:54trained by Stuart and experienced in the field.
13:59In the military, we use the same spaniels for the drugs
14:02and we use melanoirs for the more aggressive role,
14:05so each dog has a particular role.
14:07And as today is tobacco and illegal substances,
14:10that's why we're using this particular dog.
14:13And Griff's got a great record, apparently.
14:16Using his heightened sense of smell, Griff can detect the difference
14:20between real and counterfeit tobacco.
14:23Stuart will take him methodically to every potential hiding place.
14:27He'll signal to Stuart if he finds anything.
14:30Griff?
14:32Having a dog is such an asset.
14:36With this site, one dog can do what, you know,
14:39you would ask maybe a search team of six or ten people
14:45so the dogs are a really important tool.
14:48Nothing at the moment can replace what a dog does.
14:55And this unusual location won't faze him.
14:58This way.
15:02These dogs are expected to search shops, vehicles,
15:06shipping containers, you know, warehouses, houses, flats.
15:11But will he find anything?
15:14Oh, boy.
15:15So, basically, it's a needle in the haystack.
15:17As you can see, there's a lot of distractions in this area,
15:20so this could be a timely task for Griff and Stu.
15:23But if he's here, he'll find it.
15:31Yeah, come on. It's just rubbish.
15:33Come on in.
15:40What is it, Griff? What is it?
15:44That's a positive result, I reckon.
15:47He's amazing. That's just unbelievable.
15:50Let's open it.
15:59Griff, having gone through all these hidden nooks and crannies,
16:03he's now identified this container, as you can see,
16:06is showing a positive result.
16:10I know from this behaviour here,
16:12he's trained to give a passive indication.
16:14Yeah.
16:15So, just stand and stare or sit and not leave the target.
16:20When he starts growling, well, it's not a growl,
16:23but when he starts getting vocal,
16:25that's him saying, it's definitely in here, give me a ball.
16:29Yeah.
16:30So, a little treat for finding the gold.
16:33He's like, come on, I found it, give me the ball.
16:36So, yeah, absolutely, undoubtedly, this is it.
16:41Good boy, Griff.
16:42But even with Griff's positive ID,
16:45the team don't want to force entry until they're sure,
16:48so they are deploying another piece of kit I've often used in the field.
16:52That looks, down there, like packaging.
16:57So, what you're seeing here now is like what we do in the military,
17:00covert method of entry, just to have a look inside,
17:03put the scope in, have a good look.
17:05Now, we've got into the container with the torch
17:09and the camera, and we're identifying...
17:12Certainly got some boxes.
17:13A bunch of boxes at the moment.
17:14Some tarpaulins.
17:16Yeah, covered in a tarpaulin.
17:18So, we've got content in there.
17:21This is just, again, another step of confirmation.
17:24Dogs have indicated.
17:25We can see packaging in there.
17:27Not to say that's suspicious, but there is packaging,
17:29so next step is to go in and confirm it.
17:32See the light?
17:34Yeah.
17:35See it?
17:36All right, ready?
17:37Two locks to bypass, and I'm wingman for Ben.
17:50Sat one.
17:53Job done.
17:55We've now called for the locksmith who will break in
17:58and we'll get a confirmation of what's in there.
18:02But will they find anything inside?
18:08When there's a serious problem that needs to be solved,
18:11it sometimes takes someone marching to a different beat
18:16to stand up and fight back.
18:20Over a million incidents of fly-tipping are reported every year,
18:24and three-quarters of that is household waste.
18:27Homeowners themselves or dodgy waste-removal companies
18:31who don't want to pay to dispose of items legitimately.
18:38But sometimes there are even more sinister cases.
18:42Environment manager Ben Hocking had a tip-off in Huddersfield two years ago.
18:47Unusual activity at a scrapyard.
18:51It came to our attention that a large amount of waste
18:54was deposited here over a very short period of time.
18:57There were a lot of big vehicle movements.
19:00We're talking about very large vehicles here, so HGVs,
19:04and waste was deposited over just a couple of weeks.
19:084,500 tonnes of waste, which is a very significant amount,
19:11and that was waste that wasn't permitted to be on this site.
19:164,500 tonnes.
19:18That's the equivalent weight of around 600 elephants.
19:22This was illegal fly-tipping on a gigantic scale.
19:27The investigation into the perpetrators is still going on.
19:34But whoever did this had a clear MO,
19:37to save themselves hundreds of thousands of pounds
19:41by dumping their waste here.
19:43And the environmental impact of doing this was even more costly.
19:48It's really important that waste only goes to a site
19:51which is permitted to accept it,
19:53so they prevent pollution from getting off that site,
19:56escaping into a nearby river or watercourse.
19:59So you can see here we're just next to the canal,
20:01but we've also got the River Colne on this side of the site as well.
20:04And when people deal with waste in a legal way,
20:07they're really not interested in all those controls,
20:09and there can be really significant risks to pollution of the environment.
20:13But one family saw the mess left here
20:15and decided to put themselves on the front line.
20:18Melrose Metals took possession of the land two years ago.
20:22Run by site manager Caleb Watson, his dad and siblings,
20:26they set up a scrap metal recycling business.
20:29If you can see that pile there,
20:32it were a level load all the way to the gate.
20:36No-one in their right mind would take on what was left here.
20:40No. Nobody.
20:45And my dad stuck his neck out and says,
20:47yeah, this is what I'll do.
20:49We'll clean it up and hopefully in generations to come
20:52your kids will look back at a photo and say,
20:54that's the man who started it.
21:00But saving the environment doesn't come cheap.
21:03The family invested in the site
21:05to recoup the costs long-term through recycling.
21:10So we estimate the cost to be between £350,000 to £400,000.
21:15We've got rid of this last bit here.
21:18What happens to it is it gets loaded onto a lorry
21:21and then it goes to a place, EFR in Bradford.
21:24They'll sort through it and treat it
21:26and then it'll go off to its representative place,
21:28so plastic to plastic place, wood to wood yard.
21:31And they try to keep as less as they can to landfill.
21:39With another clearance lorry expected today,
21:41Ben has come to the site for reconnaissance.
21:44Hi, Rory. Nice to know you.
21:46So I've just come along today to see how you're getting on.
21:49Yeah, steady. It's OK.
21:50Obviously we got the site two years ago
21:52and we've been in the process since of getting rid of the waste
21:55and we are more or less to the back of it now.
21:57So, yeah, things are going very well, thank you.
21:59What's the plan for getting rid of some of the waste today then, guys?
22:02So a lorry of ours will be coming in 15 minutes.
22:04We'll get the machine down, back the wagon up to it
22:07and I'll load the waste onto it
22:10and then it'll be going to a waste transfer station.
22:12Great.
22:13I'm talking to the guys who are running the site now.
22:16It's probably going to be another three or four months
22:18before they get properly to the back of the site
22:20and have all the waste cleared,
22:22but in the scheme of things, that's a really fantastic result
22:25and the immediate impact that waste presents to the environment
22:28will have been tackled.
22:34And Caleb and his family are determined to see this clearance operation
22:38right through to the end.
22:40We get posts from local community about what's going on now.
22:45Alman will explain how it's got into this situation
22:48and what we're doing to clear it off the site
22:51We've got a nice field, Milnes Bridge area,
22:54a better area to live than the community around here.
22:57As you can see, we're in a valley, so everybody looks down onto here
23:01and we want them to smile and not frown.
23:15Back in Devon, we're making progress.
23:18So basically what we've done is cut through,
23:20we've got two bins, but there's one or two still holding,
23:23so we're going to get another look at that
23:26and then take out the last few.
23:37Got it, got it.
23:39Job done.
23:501248.
23:55That's all we can see.
24:00They've hit the jackpot.
24:04So what have we got at the minute?
24:06What did you find?
24:08We've got master cases of cigarettes,
24:10we've got laundry bags full of tobacco
24:12and we've got illegal disposable vapes.
24:15Vapes as well?
24:16All three.
24:17Fantastic.
24:18Stacked up in the unit are three different illegal tobacco products,
24:22all ready to be sold to the public,
24:25who might be totally unaware of the dangers.
24:28So basically all these boxes here to the right,
24:30they're all full of cigarettes?
24:32Yeah.
24:33And that's vapes and tobacco in bags over there?
24:36Yeah, hand-rolling tobacco here.
24:38Wow.
24:41Street value, roughly?
24:43Over 100,000 as a start of a 10, if not more,
24:46you know, until you get it out and you start looking at...
24:49Yeah, so each one of these is 10,000 cigarettes.
24:53It's a treasure trove of suspected illegal tobacco.
24:57You can see...
24:59..boxes after boxes.
25:03And then you've got your...
25:06..large cartons.
25:10So an absolute total variation.
25:14This gang has also left behind crucial evidence
25:17of their smuggling techniques in this lock-up,
25:20giving the team vital intel.
25:23So one of the decoys, or Trojan horses,
25:26they're using to smuggle these cigarettes in from abroad
25:29is something like this, a little storage container.
25:32That's how it's advertised.
25:34And...
25:36Hey, presto.
25:38That's what is actually inside.
25:42The storage container is filled with these Trojan horses,
25:46but this gang is clearly inventive.
25:49The team have found an air filter system for a tractor,
25:52hardly suspicious to anyone, unless you have a trained eye.
25:57There you go.
25:59Boxes and boxes of cigarettes.
26:02Boxes and boxes of cigarettes.
26:06So what's going to happen with this now, Ben?
26:08What's the next bit of the process?
26:10So we will now need to evidence this
26:13and basically remove it from this container to a secure location
26:17and then we'll go through it in a lot more detail,
26:20separate it out into brands, examine it as to what's counterfeit,
26:24and then we need to work out the values of that.
26:28And then, so, we'll then look at interviewing our suspects
26:31and putting this to them.
26:32So a great result in taking away now that financial gain
26:36that we're going to get from this crime,
26:38but also this will be linked next to the suspects
26:42who were hopefully then taken off the street and banged up.
26:45Yes.
26:46So a double whammy, hopefully.
26:48Yeah, absolutely.
26:54The whole operation was executed as planned.
26:57Each tool perfect for the job.
27:00Griff, Griff, up.
27:03Dogs are so much better than a human search team.
27:06You know, a lot quicker, a lot more thorough.
27:08So, yeah, we rely on dogs a lot,
27:10especially for this illegal tobacco work.
27:13These dogs are phenomenal and what a great result.
27:16Yeah, it's a job that a machine can't do.
27:18Yeah, fantastic.
27:21Great being on the streets here in Devon and a great result.
27:24Just like the old military days, built on intelligence.
27:27That's exactly what's happened today.
27:30From the intelligence gathered into the location,
27:33got the dogs in, identified, locksmith in, found the contraband,
27:37a street value we now believe around about £250,000.
27:41So that's taken off the street, great result.
27:45DEVON
27:51Cutting supply chains and disrupting networks
27:54is a great way to overcome any enemy.
27:57And with a little help from our four-legged friends,
28:00good can overcome evil.
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