Seized Cocaine Was Bound for Birmingham

Cocaine worth more than £400,000, seized on board a yacht 150 miles off the southwest coast of the Irish Republic last week, was intended for distribution across the West Midlands, security sources have said.

They are linking one of the world's biggest ever drugs hauls to a crime figure originally from the Summerhill area of Dublin, who is now based in Birmingham. One Garda source said the criminal has long-standing links to The Penguin, one of Ireland's most notorious and established crime bosses who now lives in Holland.

'This was, in fact, not a very sophisticated drug-smuggling operation,' one Garda officer said. The vessel, Dancing With Waves, had been sold in Trinidad and Tobago this summer for around £130,000. Britain's Serious Organized Crime Agency tracked the yacht across the Atlantic for weeks.