The Tobin brothers’ empire came crashing down after a police seizure. EncroChat messages revealed their desperate attempts to stay on top
The moment police stopped a van containing £20m of cocaine that sparked the downfall of drug lords
A cocaine boss who plotted a violent drug war with his brother was shot outside his own home after he fell into debt with a mysterious woman known as “The Banker”. Alan and John Tobin supplied hundreds of kilos of narcotics to notorious gangs across the UK.
Backed up by ex-UFC star Robbie ‘The Bear’ Broughton as their “enforcer”, the brothers enjoyed “lavish lifestyles” thanks to the misery of others. But their Liverpool drug empire came crashing down after police intercepted a van ferrying £20m of cocaine up the M6. Losing the huge 90% consignment led to John being shot over debts to a mysterious accountant.
The desperate brothers would go on to hatch a brutal plot to have a dad and son shot on their doorsteps by gunmen disguised as pizza delivery drivers. And Alan conspired with an alleged gangland boss to get another enemy “carved up” in prison.
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The two men had dreamed of making millions from their illicit business. However, they would find themselves in conflict involving some of the north west’s biggest gangland figures. As part of a weekly series about Merseyside’s crime history, the ECHO has looked back at the downfall of the Tobin brothers.
The two men’s business was described as “sophisticated, highly profitable and well-organised”. They supplied vast amounts of cocaine, heroin, ketamine and cannabis to gangs across a network that stretched across the UK. Older brother Alan, who had previously worked in a number of manual jobs, used the veneer of his job as a respected mental health nurse – based at Rathbone mental health hospital’s low secure unit, to mask his criminal involvement.
Away from the public eye, he went by the EncroChat name “CapeRocket”, while his younger brother John was known as “SlightDrake”. Between 2016 and 2020, the pair enlisted couriers utilising specially adapted vehicles with secret hides to ferry their drugs. The brothers had infamous customers including Anthony and Leon Cullen’s heavily armed Warrington gang and an outfit led by Lee Stoba, who operated his empire from behind bars.
The Tobin brothers Alan Tobin, 52, (left) and John Tobin, 40, (right)
The Tobins employed former UFC competitor Broughton as their muscle, who enforced unpaid debts and collected payments. The 18st bruiser used the handle “NovaBear” on his encrypted EncroChat phone. Much of the gang’s money ended up in Canary Wharf where it was put through various shell companies. Up to £150,000 of dirty cash was also paid into the bank account of Alan’s wife, Helen Hartley.
The drug seizure
Alan and John’s drug racket began to unravel after they instructed a man named Jamie Simpson to transport a £20m stash of cocaine from Kent to Warrington for them. Detectives made the largest ever seizure of cocaine on land in the UK when they intercepted Simpson driving the van on the M6 near Knutsford.
The raid, carried out in the early evening of August 2 2018, yielded 186kg of cocaine. The seizure would be a fatal blow to the brothers. Although John’s DNA was later found on one of the drug blocks in the van – evidence used against him by detectives later down the line – the Tobins had bigger problems than the police.
By March 2020 the brothers were struggling with “large debts”. Nicola Daley, a barrister who successfully prosecuted the two men, said: “In particular John Tobin was being put under some pressure to pay other people, it may be for wages he hadn’t been able to pay out to them for other jobs. He had been put under pressure to sell his own personal belongings to pay these amounts.”
Former MMA fighter Rob Broughton worked as the ‘enforcer’ for a drugs empire
When EncroChat was hacked in the early months of 2020, messages obtained by the police found the brothers had asked Broughton to contact someone known only as “The Banker”. It was believed the financer was a woman who acted as an accountant in the underworld drug trade.
‘The Banker’ debt
Evidence suggested John owed “The Banker” a significant amount of money and the former MMA star was “engaged to try and pull that money in”. To pay off his debt to “The Banker”, it was suggested that John sell some of his watches or jewellery. The ECHO reported on February 6 2020 that a then 39-year-old man had turned up at hospital with a gunshot wound after being targeted on a Prescot housing estate.
The victim was John Tobin. His lawyer Jason Smith revealed he was shot as part of a series of threats and intimidation by those higher up the drug trade. By April of the same year the Tobins were more “hands on” in their drug conspiracies due to a number of associates being behind bars because of the M6 seizure.
EncroChat data led to a “cold case review” by Cheshire Police of old evidence involving the Tobins and past sightings of them with gang leaders. The messages showed the men supplying kilos of cocaine “tops”, heroin “botts”, ketamine “ketts” and cannabis – “smokes and greens”.
Police at the scene of the shooting on the Brook Road Estate in Prescot
On April 2 and 3, the pair were discussing deliveries to Darlington and Sheffield, but their fortunes had changed, thanks to the loss of cash and contacts. Prosecutor Ms Daley said: “There was reference to the ‘links’ they used to have and the word they used was ‘nuggets’, which seemed to relate to those caught by the authorities, who had destroyed those links. Referring to that, there was a comment without that intervention ‘we wud b millionaires by now’.”
On the evening of April 24 2020 a man called David Barnes was shot in the leg at his Warrington home. He was not the intended target of a fake takeaway driver who had knocked on the door and shouted “pizza delivery”. Mr Barnes was shot because the gunman was looking for his stepson – heroin dealer Liam Byrne Jr.
The gunman was squaddie Aaron Bretherton. But the serving soldier was not working alone – he was part of a ruthless conspiracy that could be traced back to the desperate Tobin brothers. The attack was “part of a dispute over who controlled the movement of drugs in the Warrington area”.
Innocent man shot by fake pizza man
EncroChat texts showed an alleged gangland boss had been asking crooks for information about Byrne Jr and his dad Liam Byrne Sr and had turned to John. John sent over an image from a directory enquiries website containing the name, address and phone number of Byrne Jr’s then girlfriend.
The names, images and personal details of other potential targets were also exchanged. On April 22, the Manchester man told Alan: “I’m gonna do all them soon … liam burns … been trying get there address. Get me details I fix these muppets .. There two burns dad and son”.
It was then Alan revealed his desperation. He replied: “Same here bro stressed to f*** with bills no c*** pays chasing me tail all the time rats av put us in a hole, this virus b*****ks has slowed stuff down, is lismburns working again. I’ll get there addresses and send them over, I’ve met the two burnes.”
Police seized £20m of cocaine from a van stopped on the M6(Image: PA)
Alan would go on to send the Manchester man images of the faces of the father and son, their addresses, satellite images of where they lived and the registration numbers of vehicles they were known to use. To do so Alan turned to another associate, referred to as “Rob”, who used the handle “NovaBear”, used by Broughton, to get the final details. There was no evidence Broughton was aware of the shooting and was never charged in connection with it.
Alan would later ask his brother if “Rob” had provided Byrne Jnr’s address, to which John said he had, and that he had sent it on to the Manchester man. John then agreed to accompany his big brother on a reconnaissance trip. Yet John never specifically showed an awareness of an imminent attack.
Bretherton fired four shots at Mr Barnes at his home in Poplars Avenue before he escaped in a Transit van with getaway driver Anthony Morris and Lewis Fitzpatrick. As they fled in a vehicle Morris had taken from the garage where he worked, Morris’ phone searched online for news of the hit, looking up terms including “shooting in Warrington”.
‘I will owe you the world bro carve the c*** up’
Later that night another disguised gunman sought to target Charlie Cullen – the dad of Leon and Anthony Cullen, whose own feared drug gang had boasted access to weapons including an AK-47 rifle, pump-action shotgun, automatic pistols and revolvers. The Cullen brothers were later jailed for 22-and-a-half years and 27 years respectively.
The gunman posing as a pizza man attended a property on Sinclair Avenue in Warrington, owned by the Cullens’ dad but rented to tenants. When the gunman heard Mr Cullen didn’t live there he left. In the aftermath of the shooting in Poplars Avenue, the Manchester man sent Alan a screenshot of a news story about it and told Alan to “keep low”. Alan agreed, replying: “Keep it to just us.”
Police scientific support officers in the garden of a house on Poplars Avenue.(Image: Liverpool Echo)
The Manchester man then asked Alan which jail a man named “Alvin” was being held in. Alan asked his brother the same question, then replied to the Manchester man: “He’s put me and our kid in this f***ing hole we’re in and caused us so much s***… I will owe you the world bro carve the c*** up.”
The Manchester man responded that he would “take his eyes” and “kill his mum”. At the Tobins’ sentencing over their drug conspiracies the name “Alvin” was mentioned. It appeared Alan was owed £1.5m by “Alvin” – with Ms Daley telling a court that it is believed the nickname was used by Jamie Oldroyd – a one-time customer of the Tobins. The ECHO has reported how Oldroyd ended up on a gangland hit list.
Oldroyd had a car lease firm giving him an excuse for the 17 different vehicles he used to move cocaine around the country. He was once filmed with so much money he needed machines to count it. Cheshire Police’s Operation Dreadnaught targeted Oldroyd and led to the capture of his associate Simpson with the cocaine on the M6.
Oldroyd soon found himself in terrifying levels of debt. Businesses linked to his relatives were petrol bombed and had their windows smashed and a family home was shot at. A compound where he kept Mercedes cars was broken into and the vehicles damaged in a campaign thought to have been overseen from Merseyside.
Jamie Oldroyd, formerly of Rennie Drive, Latchford, Warrington(Image: liverpool echo)
The threat was so severe, detectives issued him and his family with Osman letters – official warnings that there is evidence someone is in danger of being murdered. It appears the threats persisted, despite the fact Oldroyd had been jailed for 14 years and three months for conspiring to supply cocaine. Simpson, 31, was locked up for 11 and a half years for the same charge.
Plotters rounded up and Glock seized
Following the shooting in Warrington, the men directly involved were soon rounded up by the police. Morris, of Fifth Avenue in Fazakerley, was arrested when his van was pulled over by police in Southport two days after the incident, while Bretherton and Fitzpatrick were caught at their homes in May 2020.
A Glock 9mm handgun was recovered from the extractor of the cooker in Bretherton’s Netherfield Road South, Everton apartment. Eight live 9mm rounds and a magazine were found in the fan in the bathroom. Gunpowder residue was also discovered on a Prada jacket and a backpack inside the flat, as was £5,000 of cash and a smoke grenade. A further £4,000 in cash was recovered from Fitzpatrick’s address in Eldersfield Road, Norris Green.
Aaron Bretherton, of Netherfield Road South in Everton, was convicted of conspiracy to inflict grievous bodily harm(Image: Cheshire Constabulary)
The Glock found in Bretherton’s flat was the same type of firearm as the one used to shoot Mr Barnes, but tests showed that it was not the same gun. However, EncroChat messages also showed the recent past of that second Austrian weapon.
Just days earlier, the Manchester man had spoken with EncroChat user “Racyocelot” about collecting a “strap”. Racyocelot sent him a postcode in the Croxteth area and Fitzpatrick, aka “LimeEagle”, was part of arrangements for Bretherton to collect the gun from the Riviera Drive vicinity. Fitzpatrick, seemingly inspecting the gun, said “mate this tool been stuck in petrol”. Racyocelot replied that it had been “kept in a shed” and Fitzpatrick told the Manchester man it was wet.
Phil Barnes, who prosecuted Bretherton and co, told a court: “The fact that Bretherton had placed the gun and the ammunition in warm places in his flat, on the heater and in the cooker hood, in order to dry them out was no coincidence.” The prosecutor said the Glock had been stored in Bretherton’s flat on the orders of the Manchester man – with Fitzpatrick again key to the arrangements.
Gun and ammunition found at the home of Aaron Bretherton(Image: cheshire police)
Gun victim Mr Barnes’ tibia and fibula were shattered by the bullet that went through his flesh and bone. He told the court he suffered with anxiety and depression, for which he was medicated. He also reported after the shooting he suffered a stroke. He added: “My life has been ruined. [It] will never be the same again – the damage caused has been traumatic and life changing.”
The Tobins before the court
The Tobin brothers helped spread pain and misery across the UK, from feeding addiction to class A drugs to setting in motion an attack that saw an innocent man open his door to a hail of bullets. But now they and many of the men they did business with are languishing in prison cells.
Between March and May 2020 alone, they discussed deals on EncroChat involving around 73kg of heroin, 83kg of cocaine, 57kg of ketamine and 78kg of cannabis. These drugs had a total estimated street value of up to £20m.
For his role in the drug plots, Alan, formerly of Regency Park in Widnes, was jailed for 20 years in April 2021. John, formerly of Manor Road in Prescot was locked up for 19 years and eight months.
In September of the same year, Alan was handed a further eight years behind bars, for conspiring to cause grievous bodily harm with intent to both Liam Byrne Jnr and Snr. Judge Driver told him: “Your input into the Liam Byrne Jnr conspiracy certainly led to the ordeal and injury suffered by Mr Barnes.”
Alan was left with a 28-year prison sentence. John was handed a further two and a half years for participating in the activities of an organised crime group, taking his term up to more than 22 years. They will serve 14 and 11 years in prison respectively.
Alan’s wife was also locked up for her part in her husband’s criminality. For possessing criminal property, mum-of-two Hartley was jailed for nine months. “Dangerous” hitman Bretherton was jailed for 22 years, with an extended five years on licence. He will have to serve nearly 15 years behind bars before he is even eligible for parole. Getaway driver Morris was jailed for 14 years.
Judge Driver said Fitzpatrick, who fell to be sentenced for ketamine and cannabis plots in addition to the shooting plot, was also “dangerous”. He was jailed for 26 years, with an extended five years on licence, meaning he now faces just over 17 years behind bars, before he can ask for his release.