Five men have been jailed at the High Court in Glasgow for their part in a multi-million pound operation that collected, stored and moved criminal cash, as first reported by BBC News. Most of the money related to payments for cocaine, heroin and cannabis, although the court heard none of the men were involved in supplying or storing drugs.

Anthony Carroll Sr, 57, of Milton in Glasgow, was jailed for four and a half years. His son, Anthony Carroll Jr, 37, of Maryhill, received three years. Ryan Carberry, 46, of Kirkintilloch, East Dunbartonshire, got three years and three months. Marc Cooper, 34, of Maryhill, was sentenced to two years and nine months, and Michael Monaghan, 37, of Drumchapel, received three years.

All five pleaded guilty to an organised crime charge. The offending took place between January 2020 and June 2020. They were also given serious crime prevention orders, lasting five years for Carroll Sr and four years for each of the others.

EncroChat evidence

The men were caught after police broke into the EncroChat encrypted phone network in 2020. The gang was kept under watch during a police investigation known as Operation Delfin.

The court heard Carroll Sr was in charge of counting, storing and distributing large amounts of cash, with almost £20m amassed in just five months. Prosecutor Leanne Cross said he directed the other four and answered to those at the top of the group, who were “by and large, based overseas”.

Ms Cross said Carroll Sr kept records and sent lists to senior gang members through EncroChat. He recorded £4m as income in January 2020, £3m the next month, £2.6m in March, around £4m in April and £4.8m in the first half of May. These sums were noted as payments for cocaine. A separate list showed around £1m came from cannabis trafficking in the early part of 2020.

Roles of the other men

The court heard police found £780,000 under floorboards at Carroll Jr’s home in May 2020, shortly after his father told him to remove the money from his own home when police arrested two other gang members. Carroll Sr’s property was searched days later, and officers seized mobile phones, £5,000 and just over 1,000 euros hidden in a cooker hood.

Carberry was described as a “cash collector” who helped organise 75 pick-ups totalling more than £6m. A total of £195,000 was found in rucksacks at his partner’s home in June 2020. Cooper looked after one of the gang’s “cash counting houses”, and one of his last messages said he had counted £1.8m in a matter of weeks. Police seized two cash counting machines from a bedroom cupboard at Monaghan’s home in June 2020.

The five were paid between £500 and £1,200 a week.

Sentencing, judge Lord Scott said: “You each took part knowingly for months in a significant organised crime operation.” He said Carroll Sr’s role was significant because he was trusted with important parts of the gang’s workings. Of the other four, he said serious organised crime groups “would not operate as they do without people like you”.

Defence lawyers said Carroll Sr profoundly regretted his involvement, while the lawyer for Carroll Jr said he was not stepping back from responsibility. Counsel for Carberry said he accepted the consequences, and the lawyer for Monaghan acknowledged that custody was inevitable.

Two other men linked to the gang, Alistair MacKenzie, 60, and Daniel Kerrigan, 56, were jailed earlier this year after a raid at a warehouse in Clydebank, West Dunbartonshire, in May 2020.