Couple jailed over £4m prescription drug ring

A couple have been jailed for raking in £4m through a black market business selling unregulated prescription drugs around the world.

Christopher Templeman, 38, was sentenced to nine years, while Lisa Harper, 39, was jailed for six years for selling the drugs between January 2020 and late 2022 from their Carlisle base.

Over 18-months, Harper spent £94,000 shipping the pills - many of them painkillers - through three local post offices, telling staff the large number of packages were for her pet care business, a court heard.

Prosecutor Gerard Rogerson said "such was her regularity as a customer and the volume of her business", the post office had to employ two extra staff "just to serve" her.

Mr Rogerson said Harper became one of the post office's best customers and told a member of staff she was looking to retire in September 2022 because her business was doing so well.

Evidence collected from her home showed parcels had been sent to Qatar, Australia, France, Canada and Norway.

Both Templeman and Harper admitted conspiracy to supply class A, B and mainly C controlled drugs and possession of criminal property.

City of London Police began its investigation after it received referrals by US Homeland Security and other law enforcement agencies.

In June 2021, two London-based suspects were followed to Carlisle where they visited Templeman's home in Furze Street and dropped off a number of cardboard boxes.

Templeman was arrested and analysis of his devices revealed he was a customer of a London organised crime group.

It emerged he used cryptocurrency to pay London suppliers and told them in messages it was "so easy to pay to India etc this way bro and can't be traced".

He was linked to a Carlisle black market traders' Facebook group and an Instagram page illegally offering prescription drugs for sale.

In late 2022, Templeman was arrested again and charged.

He was recalled to prison to serve the remainder of an indeterminate sentence imposed in 2009 for having raped a 12-year-old child.

It was at this point, the court heard, Harper, from Trafalgar Street, took over running the Facebook page for about a fortnight.

In one message she said: "I'm boss man's partner. I'm stepping in. I'm happy to take your order."

Police followed Harper to a 30ft (9.1m) shipping container, where they found the drugs business was being run.

Officers also found 724kg of prescription medication, which was estimated to be worth £1.5m.

Inside the container there was a makeshift office, furniture, gas fire and tin foil designed to fool X-ray equipment, Mr Rogerson told the court.

Many of the drugs were made by Indian pharmaceutical companies but had been stolen and redirected to the black market.

A pharmacological expert who surveyed the seized drugs said within the shipping container "were enough 10mg diazepam tablets to supply all English NHS prescriptions for that drug for 37 days".

Mr Rogerson also told the court there were "sufficient 300mg pregabalin tablets to supply the entire needs of the Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire NHS Trust areas - with a combined population of one million people - for a period of three months".

Paul Wood, mitigating for Harper, said his client was "less involved" in the illegal business and spoke of her poor physical and metal health.

"She deeply regrets what she has done," he said.

Judge Michael Fanning described the pair as "drug dealers" during Thursday's sentencing.

"The reason you did it is simple: massive, massive profit," he said.

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