{"id":362361,"date":"2025-08-21T15:24:12","date_gmt":"2025-08-21T15:24:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/362361\/"},"modified":"2025-08-21T15:24:12","modified_gmt":"2025-08-21T15:24:12","slug":"fisher-who-met-king-charles-is-jailed-for-role-in-18m-cocaine-smuggling-plot-cornwall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/362361\/","title":{"rendered":"Fisher who met King Charles is jailed for role in \u00a318m cocaine-smuggling plot | Cornwall"},"content":{"rendered":"

A respected fisher who met King Charles and government representatives to discuss the future of the industry has been jailed for taking part in a sophisticated plot to smuggle \u00a318m of cocaine into the UK.<\/p>\n

Peter Williams, 44, was sentenced to 16 years and nine months for captaining a boat that went out to pick up packages of cocaine dropped into the sea off Cornwall<\/a> by a \u201cmother ship\u201d transporting the drugs from South America.<\/p>\n

Truro crown court was told that Williams, from Havant, Hampshire, had been an upstanding member of his local community but after falling on hard times developed a drug habit and accrued a large debt.<\/p>\n

He was recruited by his drug dealers to skipper the rigid-hull inflatable boat (RHIB) for the drug-smuggling operation in September last year but it went wrong when it was spotted by a UK Border Force cutter.<\/p>\n

The fisher led Border Force officers on a 28-mile chase, which ended on Gwynver beach near Land\u2019s End when Williams ran the RHIB aground.<\/p>\n

He and other members of the gang, which included three Essex men believed to have been aiming to sell the drugs in the south-east of England<\/a>, and a Colombian man thought to have been acting as security for the South American drug cartel, were caught.<\/p>\n

Looping video of the RHIB running aground and people fleeing<\/a>A video loop showing the moment the dinghy used in the failed smuggling operation runs aground on Gwynver beach and its crew try to escape.<\/p>\n

In mitigation, Williams\u2019 barrister, Harry Laidlaw, said he had been a fisher for about 15 years, having previously worked with children in the care sector. The barrister said his problems began almost 20 years ago when his father, also a fisher, died in his presence on a boat.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis response to that was to turn to drugs, cocaine in particular,\u201d said Laidlaw. \u201cHe sorted out his addiction to a degree and managed to get his life back on track. In 2020 his marriage began to break down. Covid struck his business and he fell back into the same trap.\u201d<\/p>\n

Laidlaw said Williams had been left with \u201csignificant debt\u201d, relating to his business problems and his drug habit, and was approached by his dealers to become involved in the plot.<\/p>\n

The barrister said it had been a \u201cmassive fall from grace\u201d. He said: \u201cHe was a decent, upstanding member of the local coastal community. He represented fishermen for years in front of government and meeting the king in that capacity.<\/p>\n

The RHIB used in the \u2018at-sea drop-off\u2019 conspiracy on a Cornish beach. Photograph: National Crime Agency<\/p>\n

\u201cHe worked for a charity called Fishing into the Future. He was vice-chair of that charity.\u201d Laidlaw said he met the king \u2013 when he was Prince of Wales \u2013 on a number of occasions through the charity, speaking to him at length about sustainable fishing and getting young people involved in the industry. \u201cHe has made a terrible series of decisions,\u201d Laidlaw said.<\/p>\n

Sentencing Williams, Judge Adkin said: \u201cThis was an international conspiracy to smuggle a large quantity of cocaine into the UK.\u201d He said Williams was a \u201ctrusted gang member\u201d.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, the Guardian revealed<\/a> that law enforcement agencies had urged people living in coastal communities in the UK to help them catch drug gangs.<\/p>\n

They have warned that gangs are favouring a method called \u201cat-sea drop-offs\u201d (Asdos) in which packages of drugs are released into the ocean from \u201cmother ships\u201d for smaller vessels to pick up and take into the UK via small coves and harbours.<\/p>\n

There is growing concern the gangs may begin to use more sophisticated techniques such as deploying underwater drones, nicknamed narco submarines, to evade Border Force cutters.<\/p>\n

Williams admitted conspiracy to import class A drugs. Five other men have been sentenced over the same plot and one more is to be dealt with next month.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A respected fisher who met King Charles and government representatives to discuss the future of the industry has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":362362,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7708],"tags":[7709,7730,7731,1760,7710,519],"class_list":{"0":"post-362361","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-royals","8":"tag-british-royal-family","9":"tag-charles","10":"tag-charles-iii","11":"tag-king-charles","12":"tag-royal-families","13":"tag-royal-family"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115067451115257098","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362361","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362361"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362361\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/362362"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362361"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362361"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362361"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}