What are County Lines
Are you worried about from where your addicted family member gets their drugs? Are you worried that your family member is involved in County Lines?
County Lines is the name given to drug dealing where organised criminal gangs move and supply drugs from towns or cities into smaller towns, villages and rural areas. They will recruit and use vulnerable people, primarily children or those people with mental health issues or who have an addiction to drugs to help them to distribute the drugs. The “lines” refer to mobile phones that are used to direct a young person who is delivering drugs to outside of their home county. These are often referred to as “burner phones” that are cheap, disposable and changed regularly. Drug dealers will prefer old fashioned mobile phones over smartphones as they do not have the same tracking technology. The “county line” or “deal line” is the number that is used to give instructions about drug deals. Gangs will use children to get drugs into smaller towns or rural areas and villages, as they are more easily controlled and less likely to be picked up by the Police.
Trafficking
In legal terms, when children are forced into travelling somewhere for the illegal benefit of others, this act of exploitation is classified as trafficking under the Modern Slavery Act of 2015. Police have indicated that the most common age for children to be groomed or recruited is between 15 and 16 years old but there have been cases where children have been exploited below the age of 11. County Lines is a typical type of criminal exploitation and it is highly organised where adults use sophisticated techniques to befriend, coerce, groom and control children into helping them deal drugs. The children could be asked to store drugs, carry or move drugs either locally or between counties, or even store cash and weapons.
Cuckooing
Linked in with the illegal activity of county lines is the term “cuckooing”. This is the term used to describe the practice where drug dealers will take over the accommodation property of an adult and use it as a place to run their drug business or crime activity. The criminals will target those who are vulnerable, potentially as a result of them having an addiction or substance abuse, have mental health issues or a learning disability and befriend them only to then take over their property and use their home as a place from where they can operate. The gangs can also send young people and adults from their own area to stay at the property and distribute drugs from it, often intimidating or threatening and even giving drugs to the person who owns the property.
Trap Houses
A ”Trap House” is a building that is used by drug dealers as their main base from where they can distribute drugs. Sometimes at these locations drugs can be manufactured or cut with other drugs or substances to bulk out the drugs to increase the profit margins. Young children being exploited through county lines may be forced to stay at a trap house for days or weeks at a time and acting as couriers by disturbing drugs from that base into the surrounding area.
Urban Street Gangs
Urban street gangs play a key and rising role in the distribution of Class A drugs, particularly heroin and crack cocaine. These class A drugs dominate County lines, operating across police and local authority boundaries. Weapons related crime and violence have increased with this new trend in distribution.
The County Lines Programme
To specifically target this increase in drug dealing and child exploitation, the County Lines Programme was launched by the Home Office in November 2019. This provided investment in law enforcement in 4 major police forces in Greater Manchester, Metropolitan, Merseyside and West Midlands as these police forces cover the areas from which the majority of county lines originate. Since the initiative was launched an indicator of the extreme extent of the problem is shown with these figures from June 2024:
- 7,148 county lines have been closed
- 21,279 people have been arrested
- 10,689 individuals have been referred by police to safeguarding
County Lines Evolve
As a direct result of the county lines programme, the police have seen changes in the way that county lines operate with drug dealers moving away from cross border drug lines to a more localised business model within their area. However, the huge problem of exploiting vulnerable and impressionable children for the benefit of a drug dealer still exists. If you are concerned for your family member’s drug addiction or vulnerability, call The Haynes Clinic on 01462 851414.