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- [00:01]
Sean Williams
Time.
- [00:02]
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- [00:26]
Sean Williams
Carvana.
- [00:27]
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- [00:31]
Sean Williams
It's September 2020 in Dover, a town on the Kent coast some 80 miles southeast of London. And Britain's border force is about to hit the jackpot. It's six months since cops all over Europe cracked Encrochat, a messaging service used by the continent's biggest narco traffickers. And the Dover team is sure there is a big shipment of cocaine hidden in consignments of fruit arriving from Latin America. They've already searched 17 loads in that time. They found nothing. But you know what they say, 18th time's a charm. And on this chilly day, tucked inside dozens of cardboard boxes full of Ecuadorian bananas are 119 parcels wrapped tightly in tin foil. When the officers cut into the packages, they discover almost 1,000 blocks of cocaine, a ton of the drug in total, with a street value of well over US$100 million. The boxes are on their way to David Bilsland, a grocer by trade, but cops are more interested in his underworld connections and his market stores. The 63 year old is from Glasgow, 500 miles north of Kent, and he's linked to one of Scotland's most notorious gangsters, a man whose reputation for cold bloodedness has earned him the nickname the Iceman and whom others have described as Scotland's answer to Tony Soprano. Billsland expects to shift the gear from Dover in truck belonging to his own firm. But the bust, part of a police op called Pepperoni that spans the uk, Spain, Ecuador and tellingly, Abu Dhabi, has made sure that will never happen. Instead, Billsland, a gangster named Jamie Stevenson and four others are banged up for their blunders in the great British Bodge banana box Border bust. It's one of the border forces biggest seizures in years. A huge success, but only on paper, because Billsland and Stevenson have been around for years and they're key players in a bitter family feud for control of Scotland's lucrative cocaine, heroin and benzo markets. A feud that has for over two decades seen daylight assassinations, high speed car chases and gruesome machete attacks. Cops know that every time they take a Win, there's going to be a power struggle in the underworld. And with Billsland and Stevenson behind bars, their enemies in Glasgow, Glasgow, Edinburgh and far further afield will spot a chance to bury them. By 2024, the feud has spilled into an all out war. Homes are firebombed, gang associates shot, stabbed and threatened. Even kids are being targeted. Cop numbers are down since the pandemic and detectives fear their sleepwalking into something even more brutal than the razor wars that slept Glasgow in the 1920s and 30s, or even the the blood soaked ice cream wars of the 80s. Those guys, they never had social media. But today's mobsters are desperate to Instagram their crimes, posting videos of burning vehicles and homes, accompanied by poetic threats and a pulsing Motown soundtrack among them. A new crew has come to Scotland. Its skull and cross rifle badge is a grim, ultra violent watermark throughout. It calls itself Tamo Junto, which doesn't sound very Scottish and it isn't. Tamojunto's boss lives a thousand miles away and he's got connection to some of the scariest gangs on the planet in Spain, Dubai, and in the favelas of Brazil. Tamojunto. We're together in Portuguese. The feud just took a giant leap into the abyss. Over the coming months, as Glasgow and Edinburgh burn, details about this shady new character's life will leak in local media. He's in Dubai with links to Glasgow's football hooligan scene in bed with the mighty Kinahan cartel and heir to Latin American cocaine roots bequeathed by a pair of fallen brothers. Some call him Mr. Big, others Miami. Whether or not he'll emerge from the shadows, the kingpins men in Scotland aren't afraid to publicize their rampage of terror. These rats have been thieving for a long time. One of their messages reads addresses Billson and Stevenson's criminal pals. It's time for people to stand together as one and remove this vermin from our streets. Welcome to the Underworld podcast. Hello, everyone, and welcome to a weekly dose of true crime that dives into the criminal underworlds that affect all of our lives, whether we like it or not. I am Sean Williams, an investigative reporter and aspiring golfer in New Zealand. And I'm joined as ever, by filmmaker Danny Gold, who's once again in Spotify's shiny New York office. While I'm just sat here in the cold in my apartment, it's winter here and cold, Danny, it's summer there. Have you been enjoying that New York heat?
- [05:53]
Danny Gold
No, dude, it's been. It's been Pretty cold and rainy, haven't been able to tan. I also don't think, I don't think I've made a film in like five years. But. But okay.
- [06:02]
Sean Williams
Ah, all right. Well, I was coming to you from some positivity, but anyway, a first shout out to review us. Follow us on Spotify wherever you get your podcast. And if you want even more of us in your ears, why not throw us a couple of bucks each month on Patreon? We've got plenty of bonus shows there, reading lists, ad free shows.
- [06:20]
Danny Gold
That's patreon.com the Underworld podcast. Or you can sign up directly on Spotify or itunes.
- [06:25]
Sean Williams
Yeah, and there's always merch available too at our website underworldpod.com check that out. And if anyone's interested, I was on a recent episode of the Jordan Harbinger show chatting about Chinese money laundering in North Korea. And I think I'm also on an upcoming episode of Borderland, talking about the Pacific Drug highway. And that's something we covered back here at the beginning of this year, I think. Now this show actually comes from a tip by listener Henry Smith. And if you've got any topics or stories you think we should follow up on, reach out the underworldpodcastmail.com thanks, Henry, for getting in touch with this one. Actually, I think like you were saying it earlier, there's a bunch of people who've reached out about this topic because it's, it's pretty nuts. And if you're listening from Scotland, you are going to know all about what is happening between Edinburgh and Glasgow right now. There's firebombs, murders, campaigns of terror. Hasn't been this bad in a long, long time. But if you're anywhere else, perhaps even in England or the rest of the uk, you might even not know this is happening at north at all because there hasn't been a huge amount of media outside Scotland, apart from one, one really good feature of the Telegraph. So shout out to that. But, but this stuff is fully insane, right? And it stretches all the way from Scotland to Ireland, out to the Middle east and Latin America. And a lot of it is wound around a bitterly fierce rivalry between the hardline ultras or hooligans of Scotland's two biggest football teams, the old firm of Rangers and Celtic.
- [07:50]
Danny Gold
Oh, dude, you know, I need to rewatch Football Factory. That movie completely rules. Great movie.
- [07:56]
Sean Williams
I love that scene where they're talking about the size of each of us. Anyway. Yeah, yeah, that is a good, that is a good film. We'll touch on that A bit later on, the football stuff. But what I basically mean is that none of what you're going to hear today is happening in a vacuum. Right. The current gang war is actually a direct product of violence going back to decades and blood feuds that have raged in the Scottish narco underworld ever since.
- [08:18]
Danny Gold
Why do people in the UK love cocaine so much?
- [08:21]
Sean Williams
SEAN ON I think because of the weather day and the general disposition, actually.
- [08:28]
Danny Gold
That adds up.
- [08:29]
Sean Williams
Adds up, yeah, yeah. Anyway, before we dive into all that, a quick note to check our episode on Glasgow's ice cream wars, which did rage in the mid-80s over control of heroin supply via ice cream vans, of course, to the city's most deprived slum areas. It's going to give you a good idea of just how bad things were back then and some of the background on how Glasgow's most notorious criminals came to rule the roost. But while the ice cream van wars arguably end in 2003, when drug lord Tam McGraw flees Glasgow for Ireland, gang related killings continue. In 2004, 83 people lose their lives in mostly knife attacks. And this is of a city of just 600,000 people. And it prompts the World Health Organization in 2005 to dub Glasgow the, quote, murder capital of Europe.
- [09:19]
Danny Gold
Yeah, that's actually a lot like, especially for a place without that many guns. I mean, it's not Mexico or Brazil, but that's US numbers right there.
- [09:27]
Sean Williams
Yeah, I mean, it's especially crazy when you consider that Italy is just. It's just right there, guys. There's plenty going on there. Anyway, city officials are sparked into action and police put in place a series of violence reduction units, or VRUs, to stem the flow of blood. And it works so well, in fact, that experts from as far afield as Canada and New Zealand flocked to see just how Glasgow did it. A story for another show, perhaps similar to post Escobar. Medellin in some ways.
- [09:53]
Danny Gold
Yeah. Now, the major issue in Medellin is, you know, guys going from the States and Canada getting scopolamined by the woman they thought were totally into them for their personality.
- [10:02]
Sean Williams
Yeah, I had a friend who did a documentary on that and he said it was the darkest shit he ever reported. It was really grim. Yeah. Anyway, while cops are focused on stopping violence, drug use in Glasgow and across Scotland, it soars. Fewer organized criminals are being arrested. And heroin is being joined on the streets by cocaine because. Well, yeah, of course. And benzodiazepine, more commonly known as benzos, which are pretty strong tranquilizers, Valium and Xanax are benzos, for example.
- [10:32]
Danny Gold
Yeah, I mean the worst. Just pray you never have to get off those because they are. Or go on them to the point you have to get off them because they are. It's brutal, man. Yeah, probably worse than. Than a lot of other drugs.
- [10:42]
Sean Williams
I was gonna not give a personal anecdote, but let's not go there after this. The tightening of belts at City hall and fewer Bobby's on the beat, which is policemen in public for American listeners. And you got a pretty decent recipe for narcos to thrive all this time. The two biggest crews in Scotland are the Daniel crime family and the Lyons crime family. Both emerge in the 1990s to serve Glasgow's lucrative drug market, then worth around $400 million. Jamie Daniel, the head of his clan has risen from scrap metal dealer to cigarette smuggler to heroin kingpin. And the Daniels are the better established of the two groups. But in 2001, a feud kicks off when members of the Lions crew steal a five figure consignment of Daniel cocaine in the Glasgow suburb of Milton during a house party. Think Montagues and Capulets only with Stone island jackets and face like chewed up dog toys. Really makes you proud to be British, this stuff. Now this feud explodes in January 2003 when members of both sides are shot and injured in separate attacks. Among these are the Daniels chief enforcer, a crackpot named Kevin Gerbil Carroll, and Johnny Lyons, brother of Lyons family leaders David and Eddie Senior. So far so scrappy. In 2004, Gerbil Carroll is charged with attempted to murder alliance associate with an AK47. But the case falls apart at trial and he's a free man. Everybody's scared of him. The Paulus. I'm trying to do my limmy voice there. The cops, they are now very much aware of the feud and they're deploying more resources to Glasgow's underworld. But in Carroll, they're up against by far the most unpredictable player in the whole game, as near as a psychopath as they come in love with the violence. His rivalry with the Lyons clan goes back to childhood, when he'd been bullied by members of the family and aged 19, he's jailed for three months for car theft. By his mid-20s, Carroll is a hardened gangster and the Daniels chosen man for dirty jobs. And no job is dirtier, arguably, than the one he carries out in November 2006. Now that's when Carroll, with the aid of a 4x4 and a rope, tears down the gravestone of Eddie Lyon's senior son Gary, who had died in 1991 aged just 8 of leukemia.
- [13:04]
Danny Gold
What are the point, like, what's the point of these stunts? I mean, this is for like teenagers to do to each other. Like this is just stupid.
- [13:10]
Sean Williams
Yeah, it's dumb. And it kind of like is the inciting thing that kicks off a bunch of violence thereafter. I mean, days after this, Carol ambushes and shoots Eddie Lyons Jr. And one of his friends in a town around 10 miles southeast of Glasgow. A week after that, Carroll himself is shot and injured yet again in Bishop Briggs, just north of the city, in what is clearly a revenge attack. The following month, in December 2006, the Daniels Lyons feud kicks into a whole new gear. On the afternoon of December 6, two men pull up outside a garage on a busy road in the northern Glasgow suburb of Lambshill in a blue Mazda. Raymond Anderson and James McDonald, dressed in trench coats, pull on old man face masks and then step out of the car. The pair walk inside, traffic flying by the whole time and open fire. David Lyons, the garage owner, finds cover, but his 21 year old nephew Michael is shot and killed. Another nephew, Stephen Lyons, is also shot, but survives, as does an associate who loses a kidney. This murder, which a lawyer would describe at trial as, quote, a scene from the Godfather, makes headlines across Britain. Anderson and MacDonald are of course, hitmen for the Daniels. Ten days afterwards, David Lyons gets a note through the mail. The boys owe me £25,000 and I want what's owed to me. It's for drugs.
- [14:44]
Danny Gold
It reads very, very direct and to the point.
- [14:46]
Sean Williams
I like it. Yeah, yeah. They do it different up north and it goes on, quote, they all know what it's about. The money doesn't matter to me as it's got to be paid to the piper. I don't want the police, the boys, not even your wife knowing about it. If you keep them out of this, then all your lives can go back to normal. As we are all losing money through this. If you have any tricks for my pickup man, then the deals are off. Remember to keep your mouth shut. No cameras, no surveillance, as the pickup man doesn't know nothing, so he's no use to you. Drop off 4pm Saturday. I'll draw you a map. An X will mark the spot. That's pretty threatening. But Lyons never pays the 25k. Instead he hands the letter to the police. Anderson and McDonald, meanwhile, have been under surveillance since the Dec. 6 shooting and they've hardly been discreet, going around describing themselves as the Untouchables and talking about a mysterious piper, which you presume is probably the same piper in the letter to David Lyons. The pair lead detectives to a house on the east side of Glasgow where they discover a machine gun, grenades and ammunition, plus a bunch of weapons that have been stolen from a nearby army barracks. It's a pretty open and shut case. And in May 2008, a judge sentences Anderson MacDonald to a Scottish record 35 years in prison. Later knocked down to 30 on appeal for what he describes as a, quote, cold blooded premeditated assassination. This is all the bloody conclusion of an attempted power grab by the Lions. Basically, the Daniels had been on the scene since the 90s. They'd been the strongest, but the Lions were young, impulsive, and thought they'd spotted a chance to get the throne. But the December 2006 killing and the actions of Gerbil Carroll are the Daniel's way of snapping back, putting their rivals down. The Lions are weak at this point. They've lost a prominent family member, Steven Lyons, the nephew of David, who wasn't killed in that garage. He flees to Spain and this is crucial because it's over there that he meets members of the Kinahan Cartel, the Irish mafia that's taking over Europe's cocaine trade, amalgamated into one giant, so called super cartel with capos from the Netherlands, Albania and way further beyond. We've done a bunch of shows on them, so go to your search bar, type in Kinahan and get educated. But essentially, young Stephen Lyon is about to make connections in some very high places and they're going to pay dividends down the line. A bit like a Danny Gold shitcoin investment. How's that doing, by the way?
- [17:21]
Danny Gold
Okay, dude, so not good. But we had a spur of the moment trip to Atlantic City the other night with my, my buddy Simon Ostrovsky, who's a fantastic journalist who reports a lot on Ukraine stuff. And I don't know if you've ever been to Atlantic City, but it is not a nice place to go. So we had a. We had a system and the system did not work. When you step up to the roulette table and the first spin is a double zero, you should just leave the table, keep walking, walk out the door of the casino and then leave. We did not do that. And now I really need you guys to support the Patreon this month. But also Atlantic City is the only casino I've ever been to. We went to. Where do you go? The Borgata and Oceans, where the people working the tables, like the dealers and the table people, they're like significantly rude to you. Like, they'll like give you shit for losing. It's the exact opposite of Vegas where they like, they're nice and they like, want to be hospitable. They'll, they'll like, talk shit to you and like, make fun of you for losing. It's ridiculous. I mean, it's Jersey, dude. What do you expect?
- [18:22]
Sean Williams
I need to go anyway. I want to go. Take. Take me.
- [18:24]
Danny Gold
No, you don't. You don't need to go. You don't need to go.
- [18:27]
Sean Williams
I don't know, man.
- [18:27]
Danny Gold
Just listen to the song and that's.
- [18:29]
Sean Williams
That'S all you need Anyway. Now in the story, remember this podcast thing we're doing? We've rattled all the way up, we're all the way up to late 2009. So the Daniels have beaten the Lions into submission and Gerbil Carroll, lifetime member of the psycho club, he rules the streets of Glasgow. He carries out a series of so called alien abductions on rival dealers across Scotland. They're named because, having been brutally tortured, beaten and robbed, none of the victims tell police they can remember a thing about it. Gerbil was by most accounts a maniac, writes Glasgow. Live and incorrigible. Not a great combination. Carroll is, unsurprisingly making enemies left and right. He's getting more and more out of control, and it's clear that if anybody's going to silence them, they're going to need to come at him with something more audacious than anything that's gone before. Not least when, in January 2010, Carroll shoots and injures Eddie Lyons Jr. Again, this time in the army. The Lions might be down, but they're not out. And the latest act by Carol is an excuse they need to do something big. On January 13, 2010, at around 1pm, Carroll has arranged to meet a drug pusher named Stephen Glenn, who is associated with the Lyons family, at the supermarket car park in Glasgow. You're working for me now, he tells Glenn, trying to poach him from the Lyons. Anybody that doesn't fall into line is going to get banged. But listener Glenn isn't going to get banged. It is he who will do the banging. Minutes later, Carol was sitting in the back of a black Audi A3. A great car, a winner's car. True Wellington, Dad's car. When a Volkswagen Golf screeches to a halt in front of it, Carol's two associates leaps out of their front seats, leaving him alone in the vehicle. The child locks are on. He's Trapped, two masked men emerge from the gulf and open fire. The rear window shatters as does Carol's head and chest from 13 shots in total across almost 30 seconds, leaving him slumped dead on the sea. Now, sure, Glasgow can be a rough place, but a military style execution in broad daylight in an ASDA car park, that just ain't cricket. Local media goes into overdrive talking about a Sopranos style hit. I mean, is there a Sopranos hit like that, Danny? And the BBC describes it as, quote, arguably the most public gangland hit ever carried out in Scotland.
- [21:06]
Danny Gold
I mean, there's a hit like that in every single mafia movie and show. There is. What's the. I mean, when they kill him, who did they kill in his driveway last season when they're at war?
- [21:17]
Sean Williams
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I actually remember this one, but I don't remember any of the names in the surprise.
- [21:21]
Danny Gold
The two guys that asked him what directions are. They're Italian. Directions are. And they also shoot up. Is it Mustang Sally who they kill? Who Junior has killed?
- [21:29]
Sean Williams
I don't know. I'm leaning.
- [21:30]
Danny Gold
I don't know. They shoot people in their calls all the time, but who knows? That's every mafia movie or something like that. Although the machine guns I think is machine guns, right?
- [21:37]
Sean Williams
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [21:38]
Danny Gold
That might be different.
- [21:38]
Sean Williams
Yeah. I mean, I don't know. We've got like Godfather style hit and Sopranos style hit.
- [21:44]
Danny Gold
So I think tldr, you throw that in there.
- [21:46]
Sean Williams
Lazy media.
- [21:46]
Danny Gold
That's how you do it. You throw, you throw that in there. Yeah. Business owners, quick question. When someone hears your phone number, does it stand out or does it just sound like a bunch of numbers? A bunch of, you know, just some jumble that no one's gonna remember. Let's fix that with Ringboost, the go to service for custom phone numbers that make your business stand out. Whether you're running a small business or scaling something big, the right number makes it ridiculously easy for customers to remember you and actually call. You can get a local number to connect with a regional audience. You can also get a number like 1-800-home- care or 833 roofers. There's plenty of options for every industry. You know, if you're a plumber and your number ends in like 495 7, no one's going to remember that. But if your number ends in 888 leak, somebody is going to remember that and they're going to call. Here's the best part. Super affordable, super easy, and it can help drive more calls to your business, more trust. So if you're ready to sound like the business people want to call, head over to ringboost.com and use promo code Underworld for an exclusive discount. That's ringboost.com, promo code Underworld, ring boost, because voice matters.
- [22:55]
Sean Williams
Anyway, the prime suspect in Carol's shooting is a Lions trigger man named William Buff Patterson, who, because he's clearly innocent, flees to Spain 10 days after the murder. I mean, I don't know why any of these guys are getting out to Spain. It's just nuts. Buff spends more than four years on the run and he features on the UK Serious Organized Crime Agency's Top 10 Most Wanted list. But in 2014, he hands himself into a police station in Madrid. He's sent back to the UK and he's convicted and sentenced to 22 years. In a mark of Carroll's notoriety, court officials read out a list of 99 potential suspects in his death. A number of tit for tat killings follow. But the scales of power in Glasgow and Scotland are really tipped in the Lion's favour. In July 2016, that's when Jamie Daniel, chief of the Daniels family, dies of cancer, aged 58. Carol, the crew's top enforcer, is long dead and nobody's been found with half the appetite for chaos since. Furthermore, Daniel's son and her apparent Xander Sutherland is behind bars on a lengthy heroin wrap. So there's a big power vacuum at the top of the Daniels crime family and it's unclear who's going to fill it. At the same time, the Lions, supercharged by the connections to the Kinahans and Europe's exploding cocaine trade, spot yet another chance to become the kings of Scotland's underworld. Almost a decade after the garage shootout that nearly killed them off. In the five months following Jamie Daniels death, they carry out five attempted murders. One of them is Robert Daniel, who on December 8, 2016, is rammed in his car by another vehicle, chased into a house, then hacked at twice in the head with either a hatchet or a machete. Here's the BBC quote. Asked in court if he was aware of any ill feeling between the Daniel and Lyons family, Robert, 29, replied, not that I know of. Now, that guy's is a real ometa for you. No pentiti here, Italians. The most gruesome of these attacks is dealt out to Steven bonzo Daniel. On May 18, 2017, Daniel's heading home after dropping off some friends when his car is rammed again by a VW Golf, which is then joined by an Audi A3. It's a great car, Danny. It's really. It's a really cool car for, like, super cool people. And a crazy chase in series through Glasgow, hitting speeds of up to 100 miles per hour.
- [25:22]
Danny Gold
You know, Audi is like a luxury car in America. I don't know if it's like that in New Zealand or Europe, but you're like a luxury man.
- [25:29]
Sean Williams
Is it still a luxury car when it's from 2011 and you can't switch any of the dials over from the Japanese, which is initially in.
- [25:35]
Danny Gold
So I have a Hyundai Genesis, which is a luxury sedan. I think it's just the Genesis now. Also from 2011. Amazing car. Those Koreans, they know what's up, man. Yeah, you know what's up, I think.
- [25:46]
Sean Williams
I mean, like, modern cars, they just ain't built like that anymore. You could. No, you can slam my car.
- [25:51]
Danny Gold
It's like a 2000 Honda. 2000 Honda Accord, dude, you could do anything with that car.
- [25:55]
Sean Williams
It's like.
- [25:55]
Danny Gold
It's like a Mario Kart car.
- [25:56]
Sean Williams
Incredible, man. Anyway, Daniel's car eventually hits an off ramp north of town. He's probably got a shit car in. In comparison, which leaves him unconscious, slumped at the wheel. You wouldn't get that with the Audi while he's in that state. His chasers cut him so badly with a series of blades and that his nose is almost severed entirely. And his facial wounds are so bad that first responders assume he's been shot. Daniel survives the ordeal, telling a courtroom he doesn't remember it at all. Neither does Daniel, age 39. Does he believe he has any enemies? It's just a complete shock attack.
- [26:30]
Danny Gold
Who would have thought these guys just like to slice. You know, a wise man once said, you're whack if you don't appreciate knives.
- [26:38]
Sean Williams
Yeah. And. And, yeah, that is. That is really good advice. Obviously, the police just don't pack their stuff up and abandon the case. Right. It turns out that Daniel's car, a bad car, an idiot's car, had been fitted with a sophisticated tracker, allowing his attackers to mark his whereabouts. And this is one of the key bits of evidence leading to convictions for six associates of the Lyons family in May 2019 for five murder plots, sentencing them to a total of 104 years in prison. You sought to turn Glasgow into a war zone for your feud, says the judge, Lord Mulholland. This is a civilized city which is based on the rule of law. There is no place for this type of conduct, retribution, or the law of the jungle. But, well, we all watch Mulholland Drive. The beginning is the end and everything comes around in circles, right? Great movie, but I don't know, man, just writing that. Do you remember the creepy hobo jump scare? I watched that after smoking a bowl and it just about gave me a heart attack.
- [27:34]
Danny Gold
I think our listeners really want to know, or they want you to specify. A bowl of what exactly?
- [27:38]
Sean Williams
A bowl of soup. Anyway, Lord Mulholland is totally wrong. Glasgow definitely is a place of retribution. I mean, you just heard it like for the last 20, 25 minutes. And the law of the jungle. In early 2020, French, Dutch and British authorities crack the Encro chat system, though, giving them access to millions of messages exchanged by the biggest narco kingpins in Europe. We did a show way back when this all happened with report Ed Caesar, who wrote a brilliant New Yorker piece about the fallout from Encore Chat. So definitely listen to that when you get a chance. But among the top level criminals giving away their secrets to the cop like they're on MySpace, one of them stands out in the UK, Jamie Iceman Stevenson is a 59 year old drug smuggler who is well, well known in criminal spheres. Back in 2007, a judge jailing him for 12 years had said that, quote, it is clear that you occupy an important position in the world of organized crime. Money laundering provides an essential service to the drugs trade and contributes materially to its profitability. What they're saying by that is that this guy is a really, really big deal. It's really sophisticated and crucially, he is a lion's associate and by extension an associate of the Kinahans, operating out of Dubai and working with members of the Lyons family. But with the Dover banana shipment from the cold open, he's been caught. Absolutely banged to rights, Stevenson goes on the run in the Netherlands. But in 2022, two years later, he's caught when, get this, a pal he's on the land with goes on a bender in Amsterdam's red light district using a bank card the police are monitoring. They're caught, brought back to the UK and in October 2024, Stevenson is jailed for 20 years while his associates, including David Bilsland, the grocer who was in on the Dover plot, they get a total of 29 years. During the trial, authorities lift the lid on a Stevenson plan to flood Scotland with millions of tablets of etizolam, also known as street Valium, from a factory in Kent. Stevenson's kingpin days may be over thanks to this banana bust, but drug use is going bananas across Scotland. Nonetheless, in 2023, there were 1,172 drug misuse deaths in the country, which is a 12% increase on the previous year. This is actually over four times higher than the number of deaths back in 2000 when heroin was ripping few communities and opioids still account for 4/5 of all deaths today.
- [30:12]
Danny Gold
And still no fentanyl. Interesting that, huh? The profit margins there being way higher.
- [30:18]
Sean Williams
Yeah, there's, there's a bunch of ideas for that, but I guess we, we started getting into that in the China episode a little bit as well. From, from back then.
- [30:25]
Danny Gold
That's the whole point.
- [30:26]
Sean Williams
Yeah. Yeah. Dundee, the fourth largest city in Scotland and really close to Edinburgh, has some of the worst stats of drug abuse in the whole uk. Cuckooing, which is the practice of criminals taking over somebody's house, usually under threat of death, to use a drug den or stash house, has become so rife in the city, the NGOs has been set up specifically to combat it and folks have even fled town to escape it.
- [30:52]
Danny Gold
That practice needs a scarier name.
- [30:54]
Sean Williams
Yeah, it is awful. Like, it's fully. Oh, my God, the stories you read about that. Just. Yeah, don't read it, just listen to this show. Anyway, benzos have been identified in almost 60% of. Of drug death cases in Dundee. So it's fair to say that if Stevenson's pill factory had got up and running, there could have been a public health disaster on Scotland's streets in recent years. Of course, cocaine has flooded Scotland's streets just like it has everywhere. I mean, there are uncontacted tribes in the Indian Ocean that are probably on the gear. Each Friday night in Scotland, there has been increased concern over the rise in people injecting the drug, especially in Edinburgh. Locals call this prop. And one user has told local station STV that its use is, quote, an epidemic. It's actually shook the town, to be honest. Add to this increased levels of synthetic opioids like nitazines finding their way into the Scottish drug supply chain, and you've got this situation whose potential for death and destruction, not to mention the crimes associated with tons of folks being off their heads on coke and smack, far outweighs the stuff Irving Welsh was writing about back in the early 90s. Okay, so there's your context. But what doesn't help in all of this either is the role of football hooligans or ultras being thrown into the mix. Glasgow is home to two of the biggest clubs in Europe, Rangers and Celtic, and it's one of the darkest rivalries in world sport. Very long story, very short. Glasgow is very closely bound to the history of neighboring Northern Ireland, traditionally being a place of high immigration by Irish Catholics, especially after the. The Great famine of the mid-1800s. And so it has taken on the north sectarian divisions between Catholics and Protestants. Rangers, traditionally Protestants Loyalists, they're often union flags and royal imagery at their games. And Celtic, as the name suggests, traditionally Irish Catholic club with all the links that entails, including to the ira. At the extreme ends of this spectrum are two sets of ultras. On one side, Rangers Union Bears, which does sound like a gay club, and Celtics Green Brigade, which sounds less gay and more like a name for the Hoots bar staff on St Patrick's Day. Both are deep into cocaine use. What else? And along with it, violence British football hasn't really seen since the 1980s, when English clubs were banned from Europe and deaths at matches weren't too uncommon. Research last year suggested that cocaine use, which is so rife in this world, may have superseded excessive drinking as a cause of violence and antisocial conduct in the modern game. Fans, supporters associations, police officers, government advisors and safety groups in England and Scotland were all interviewed about the relationship between matchgoers and alcohol during an extensive three year study. And it was found that class A drug use was of far greater concern. Cocaine, they say, is part of the problem.
- [33:44]
Danny Gold
How do they do that research? Are they like. Test subject A said he had a couple of pints and he was feeling okay and then did a bunch of lines and then he beat the crap out of something. Like, how does that, how does that work? Yeah, based on sentiment, I guess.
- [33:58]
Sean Williams
Come back to me on that one in.
- [34:00]
Danny Gold
Yeah, the methodology needs to be investigated.
- [34:02]
Sean Williams
Yeah, but the ultras aren't just involved in taking drugs. Entire Scottish clubs have been found out to be owned by criminal figures. And gangsters have long taken cuts in transfer fees. I guess a bit like the Yasser Puig stuff in the U.S. fun fact, I once caught a Puig flyball in Oklahoma City.
- [34:19]
Danny Gold
Wait, what's that story? Was he one of the guys? You know, there was like an 80s baseball cocaine ring among players. Is that the one you're talking about? That's much more recent.
- [34:26]
Sean Williams
Right? He was like owned. He was part owned by gangsters with the cut, like the Mexican cartels or something that brought him over from Cuba. Then he owed them a bunch of money, I think it was. Damn. Yeah, I. I can't remember how that finished, but I think he's playing in Mexico now. So maybe he's having a better or worse time reach out to us. Yes, Hill back to Scotland however, one of the key players in the Jamie Stevenson banana bust is Lloyd Cross, a self styled top boy of the Union Bears who's followed Rangers all around Europe and has been arrested doing so. It is Cross's vehicle recovery firm that's been used as a drug shipping group for Stevenson, and Cross has been working closely with Billsland, the grocer to get the gear from Dover to all corners of the UK. In October 2024, just weeks after Cross's sentence alongside Stevenson, Billsland and their gang, the Union Bears unfurl a banner at a Europa League match against Lyon reading no Surrender lc Lloyd Cross and Ranger's Riot Crew while setting off fireworks over the head of their own goalkeeper. Cross is a Union bear. Ranger's daft and still has a lot of friends in the group, one source tells the Scottish Sun. But flaunting your support for a drug dealing thug while aiming fireworks over your own goalie's head shows just how brainless this mob are. Here's the thing, Stevenson, Bilsland and Cross, like I said earlier, they're all Lyons family associates, Kinahan associates. With them behind bars, things will likely get more violent. And on the other side of the feud, remember how Jamie Daniels death left a power vacuum at the top of the Daniels Klan? That void is filled by Edinburgh based Mark Richardson, who in 2018 is jailed for eight years after being caught with a Glock pistol and another 18 months is added to his sentence for a high speed car chase with the cops. So some of the biggest Lions players have gone down for the banana bust. And there's trouble at the top of the family too. Remember Steven Lyons, Lyons family nephew who ran off to Spain after the 2006 garage shootout? He's gone from there to Dubai, the mothership for global organized crime, and he's alleged to have racked up debts to the Kinahan cartel for a bunch of failed deals during the pandemic. And those are not the people you want to be in the red with. The Lyons family seems like it's in a state of disarray, but the Daniels crew is arguably even more shambolic. With no Jamie Daniel or Gerald Carroll, Mark Richardson takes over the crook from Edinburgh with a long and distinguished rap sheet. In 2010, courts sentenced him to 10 years prison, aged as 23 when he's caught trying to sell $3 million of heroin and crack across Scotland's capital. Several years later, he hooks up with Steven Bonzo Daniel. Remember the guy who got his face macheted half off. And together they run the Daniels criminal enterprise. Bonzo's face is a complete mess. Looks like a topographical map. Real hellraiser vibes. In 2017, Richardson is swept up in a huge police sting, Operation Escalade, which reveals, among other things, that Scotland's biggest gangsters are now traveling to Brazil to meet face to face with leaders of the First Capital Command, the pcc, stockpiling military grade weapons and torturing enemies with incredible levels of violence. Among them are brothers James and Barry Gillespie, who then go on the run in Brazil. And the following January Richardson cops this almost nine year sentence, later increased to over a decade. And then Richardson just looks like a regular bloke. He's like pink skin, loose shirts, slightly overweight, he's basically British, but he's sophisticated. He launders money for a series of complicated schemes. And he runs the Daniels family from prison, quarterbacking drug deals and building up a groundswell of support in Edinburgh to try to take Glasgow from the Lyons family, which is a pretty dangerous business even if the Lyons leadership is all over the place. Between 2017 and 2021, Scottish police track over 70 incidents related to this violent turf war in something they call Operation Engagement, which threatens to blossom into an all out war at any moment. The authorities though, they're fighting a losing battle, not least because their own house is in shambles. As Glasgow had climbed from its murder capital status and politicians down south in Westminster had hopped aboard the bandwagon narrative of of positive change. The Conservative government had cut budgets dedicated to combating organized criminal groups. The number of Scottish police officers has fallen by almost a thousand. And all this is coming at the same time as Scotland's cocaine market is soaring, says Graham Pearson, former head of the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency. Quote, those involved in organized crime have had a fairly joyful time developing their business with the odd casualty. As law enforcement intervenes, most of those who might have been able to change the situation have lacked the commitment to see things through and have prioritised other areas such as the NHS and education. Organised crime was overlooked and the wealth and power of those people has developed and become more confident. Another retired cop speaking to the Telegraph puts it simpler, quote, you need to keep your foot on the neck of the violence. Today there are 90 serious organised criminal groups operating in Scotland and over 1400 people involved in criminal activity. As of Last March, only 158 of them were in prison. Scotland now has the worst drug death rate in Europe, with over twice the rate of England, Wales and Northern Ireland, which are the UK's other three constituent nations.
- [40:21]
Danny Gold
Wow, that's worse drug rate than all of like, including Eastern Europe, apparently.
- [40:26]
Sean Williams
So yeah, it's nuts. It's really, really bad there.
- [40:29]
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Danny Gold
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Sean Williams
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- [41:57]
Sean Williams
All of this is mixing into a deadly cocktail of cocaine, riches, power vacuums and blood feuds. Add to this the fallout from Operation Phonetic Ecrochat and the banana bust and you have a recipe not just for turf wars, but chaos. Every time police have a success like the Stevenson case, it has repercussions in the criminal world. A former undercover cop tells the Telegraph. The criminals look to see how vulnerable they are. They start looking inwards at scapegoats, and violence is their answer to everything. When police have a success, it's actually pouring petrol on the fire. Steven Lyons, the Lyons family scion, leaves Dubai amid his debt trouble with the Kinahans. Into this void and chaos steps a third player, a guy keen to stamp his own mark on Scotland from a Home in Dubai, where he'd been since 2022 after evading criminal charges. Back home, a man with a history as a union bears ultra with links to Lloyd Cross and Jamie Stevenson, who can source drugs from the Kinahans and get them to the Lions and Daniels from Europe's shipping ports. A man known to media only as Miami. Miami also has links to James and Barry Gillespie, the fraternal mobsters who've gone missing in Brazil, presumed by now to be dead and killed out there. Perhaps Miami had a hand in it, perhaps not. But this guy has friends in almost all the high places you can imagine. And in March this year, he makes a $700,000 cocaine deal with associates of Mark Richardson, the head of the Daniels clan. Here's what happens next. According to an anonymous source speaking to the sun, quote, one of Richardson's crew went out to Dubai for a few weeks and agreed to take 16 kilos of cocaine, but didn't pay. Another guy ended up paying with fake notes rather than genuine cash. Moves like this just aren't tolerated. It's the old paper in the briefcase trick, guys. I mean, I guess it must work sometimes, but I wouldn't advise ripping off some psychotic cocaine kingpin with it. And Miami, unsurprisingly, goes into a bloodthirsty tailspin. A contract is put out on Richardson's life and guards move into a new prison. Bonzo Daniels, he of the slashed up face, actually moves from Glasgow to Dubai as he thinks it'll be safer out there. By late March, masked goons are firebombing homes, businesses and cars belonging to Daniel's family associates. Before long, attacks are being filmed and post to social media. One minute long example on March 23rd includes a montage of Alison Strikes set to the Vandellas, Nowhere to run, which, yeah, it's a stone cold banger and something straight out of a Guy Ritchie movie. This is a message to anyone associated with Mark Richardson. The caption reads, we are only just getting started. We are coming for all of you. The violence, of course, is just getting started. Throughout March and April, more homes and cars are vandalized as Miami makes his mark on Richardson and the Daniels. In late April, the perpetrators named themselves Tamo Junto, which means we are together in Brazilian Portuguese. Their badge is pretty gnarly. A growling skull in St Andrew's flag colours flanked by cross assault rifles and TMJ 2025. I've put it in the script so that he can actually give his professional opinion. What do you reckon?
- [45:17]
Danny Gold
It's pretty Sick. I mean, it does look like a death squad from a Marvel movie. But also I see tmj. Isn't TMJ that thing that, that people get in their jaw or like you got to get Botox for it because it, because it like grinds a grinding thing?
- [45:28]
Sean Williams
I think this is like Brazilian plastic surgeons or something.
- [45:31]
Danny Gold
No, I think that that skull in the, in the logo is suffering from that, which is unfortunate.
- [45:35]
Sean Williams
Fair enough. That wasn't the analysis that I'd expected, but anyway. One video shows members breaking into a residential home in broad daylight, battering down the front door with weapons and leaping through a ground floor window. We are urging everyone in Scotland on the streets and those incarcerated to join us in the fight against Mark Richardson and the Daniels family.
- [45:56]
Danny Gold
A caption reads, this is like Mexican cartel level stuff happening here, huh?
- [46:00]
Sean Williams
Yeah, it's, it's, it's mad, man. It's so public as well. Yeah. Amid all of this, Bonzo Daniels home is firebombed and 135 grand bounty is placed on his head. In May, Bonzo comes back from Dubai to Glasgow. Weirdly, he's got a panic room in his house and still bollards in the drive outside to avoid any vehicle ramming attacks. Miami's men, one source tells Glasgow live, quote, know everything about his movements and haven't ruled out going after him at a Rangers game. But attacking him at Ibrox, which is the stadium, with the amount of police there would be difficult. Another Daniels associate who flees to Thailand is tracked down there and slashed across his face, leaving a pretty brutal wound. More recently, children and family of gangsters have been targeted, saying that hasn't happened since the early days of the Lion's Daniel feud some 20 years back. Says Graham Pearson, the former cop. Quote, it is a complex picture because you've got people who are in prison who still want to have influence inside and outside and look after what was their business on the outside. You've got wannabes who are coming forward and they think this is an opportunity for them. And you've got others who have old scores to settle that they could not settle when crime bosses were around. All of that mixes together and the greed for the money that comes from drugs and from the kudos that comes from being a main man. And you end up with competition, violence and the kind of incidents we've seen. On May 17, media finally lift the lid on Miami's identity. His name is Ross McGill, a 31 year old former leader of the Union Bears Ultras. He's actually fled Scotland in 2022 at the fallout of the Encro chat banana busts, initially to Spain and then of course to Dubai. He's had a bunch of failed legit enterprises, including a pie company, construction takeaway food, mobile phone stands, a restaurant, a dry cleaning firm, management consultancy and a fitness outlet McGill could have attended. Failed. Connor blogged about his corporate woes on LinkedIn, but he went down a far more honorable path. Cocaine trafficking.
- [48:07]
Danny Gold
I mean, honestly, he gave literally every other business a try, which, like fair play, but also, I would assume you would have to be a better businessman to sell cocaine rather than pies, but I guess not.
- [48:18]
Sean Williams
Yeah, I don't know. It's hard to make a. I know all too well how hard it is to make a good mince pie. The sun reports that McGill took over Narco roots in Brazil after the demise of the Gillespie brothers, who are still missing, presumed dead, and being young and protected, he doesn't seem to care whether Tamo Junto's war lasts for months or even years, which despite some low level arrests, seizures and raids, it really could do. McGill's men are hardly hiding their intentions either, goes a recent post. Quote, daniels and Richardsons, every associate, every business will be targeted. Leave Scotland immediately. Exterminate the Daniel virus. To be continued. Which as an addendum, just yesterday as we're recording this, so June 1st, two men were shot dead outside a bar in Malaga. Their names Ross Monaghan, who, I'm sure this is a complete coincidence, but who was linked to the killing of Kevin Gerbil Carroll in 2010. And get this, Eddie Lyons Jr. So this one folks is very much live and if anyone knows anything about it, get in touch. The Underworld podcast mail.com it is a crazy one.
- [49:29]
Danny Gold
Yeah, wild. Especially with that happening Yesterday. As always. Patreon.com the Underworld podcast Spotify itunes Write reviews, say nice things. Thank you guys again for tuning in.
- [49:40]
Sean Williams
It Sam.
- [50:53]
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