R v Mohammed Nazari [2026] EWCA Crim 842
[1]On 25 September 2025 in the Crown Court at Canterbury, the appellant was convicted after trial of three counts of conspiracy to fraudulently evade the prohibition on the importation of class A drugs (cocaine, heroin and MDMA). On the same date he was sentenced by the trial judge, HH Judge Fowler, for those three offences and for a further count of conspiracy to fraudulently evade the prohibition on the importation of class B drugs (ketamine) to which he had pleaded guilty on an earlier occasion. He was sentenced to 14 years' imprisonment on each of the class A drugs conspiracies, to run concurrently, and seven years' imprisonment to run concurrently on the class B matter.[2]He appeals against sentence on the basis that the trial judge was wrong to find that he played a leading role in the conspiracies and that the failure to attribute to him a significant role led to a sentence that was manifestly excessive. He also complains that no or no sufficient reduction was made for his personal mitigation, which primarily focused on the impact of his imprisonment on his four young children, aged between one and eight years at the time.[3]The judge, having had the benefit of hearing the evidence at trial, understandably sentenced without ordering a pre-sentence report. We do not consider it necessary to order such a report in order to determine this appeal.[4]The facts can be stated briefly. At 1.25 am on 14 September 2023, a British registered Nissan car was stopped at the inbound tourist zone in the Eastern Docks at Dover. The driver was a man named Ricardo Valentino. A search of the car was conducted and a sophisticated concealment area, which operated with a hydraulic device, was found in the boot. Inside the concealed compartment officers found a huge quantity of drugs: six kilograms of cocaine, three kilograms of heroin, 41 kilograms of MDMA and 11 kilograms of Ketamine. The wholesale value of the stash was £531,000 and the street value £3 million. Valentino subsequently pleaded guilty to four counts of importing drugs into the United Kingdom.[5]On interrogation of Valentino's phone, messages were found with a contact saved as “AK” which related to the transfer of ownership and collection of the Nissan car, the booking of ferries for Valentino, and the making of arrangements in the Netherlands for the collection of the drugs. AK used two phones, one of which was registered in the Netherlands. The messages suggested that AK was orchestrating the importation that occurred on 14 September 2023. There was no dispute that the appellant was AK and that he was in regular contact with Valentino.[6]The telephone traffic showed that the appellant made contact with the people in the Netherlands who had arranged for the drugs to be placed in the concealed compartment in the Nissan. Valentino was given directions to park the Nissan at an address in Rotterdam and to send a picture of where it was parked. The prosecution case was that the drugs were loaded into the Nissan at that location.[7]A co-defendant named Danijel Ivankovic, who had also pleaded guilty to the ketamine conspiracy, had been the registered keeper of the Nissan car immediately before its ownership was transferred to Valentino on 8 September 2023. He too was in contact with the telephone numbers associated with AK. Ivankovic journeyed to Europe in the Nissan on three occasions between 14 July and 27 August 2023. He stayed at the same hostel in Rotterdam at which Valentino subsequently stayed. There was also coinciding travel between the appellant and Ivankovic. Two days before the trip on 14 July, the appellant withdrew £1,000 from his account and the following day Ivankovic deposited £900 into his account, subsequently paying for a ferry ticket and for vehicle tax and insurance. The prosecution case was that the appellant was paying Ivankovic to import drugs into the UK on those three earlier occasions, and that he recruited Valentino to take his place.[8]The appellant and Ivankovic were both arrested on 22 January 2025. They both gave “no comment” interviews.[9]At trial, the key issue was whether the appellant was aware that class A as well as class B drugs were being imported. The jury resolved that matter against him.[10]The appellant, who was aged 34 at the time of sentence, had one previous conviction in 2015 for possession of a bladed article, for which he received a community sentence.[11]In his sentencing remarks, the judge referred to the sentencing guidelines for the importation of class A and class B drugs. He said that in the case of the appellant there seemed to him to be features of leading role. He identified these as: organising and buying on a commercial scale; the expectation of substantial financial advantage; being able to offer rewards of £7,000 to those he recruited and to supply an adapted car; influence over those below him in the chain, and he was dealing with drugs on the last trip worth £500,000. However, there were also features of a significant role. The judge accepted that there was a hierarchy above the appellant, that he was performing at times an operational function within a chain and he had an awareness and understanding of the scale of the operation.[12]The judge then pointed out that the indicative quantity in the guidelines for category 1 for harm for each type of class A drug was five kilograms. Whilst the quantity of heroin taken on its own was less than that indicative quantity, the total of all the class A drugs found in the Nissan on the last trip was 50 kilograms. If it had been charged as one conspiracy to import class A drugs, (which it could have been) that would have been the indicative amount. The amount of ketamine (11 kilograms) was twice the indicative quantity.[13]The judge then referred to the different sentencing ranges for leading role and significant role concerning a single class A category 1 offence. For leading role, the starting point is 14 years' imprisonment with a range of 12 to 16 years, whereas for significant role the starting point is 10 years with a range of nine to 12. The judge pointed out that whilst he had identified elements of both leading and significant roles, and there was what he described as “a crossover point” of 12 years between the two categories, taken as a whole there was ten times the indicative amount of class A drugs. The guideline indicated that in some circumstances, for quantities significantly above the indicative amounts, sentences of over 20 years may be justified. However, the cases indicated that these should be reserved for those clearly falling within a leading role. So far as the ketamine was concerned, the crossover point between the two categories was seven years, but again the amount of drugs was twice the indicative quantity.[14]In terms of personal mitigation, the judge referred to the fact that this would be the appellant's first experience of custody and that experience had been particularly harsh in the current regime. The appellant had been incarcerated during the Covid-19 outbreak, which led to prisoners being locked in their cells for 23 hours a day. He referred to the appellant's sole previous conviction, to the fact that he was a family man, and to 16 character references which made it clear that he was a devoted father, husband and respected in-law, who lent a hand in the community and was generally highly regarded. The judge said that he suspected that the appellant focused on the money making opportunity of these ventures and gave little thought to the murky world he had actually become involved in.[15]The judge took count 3, the conspiracy to import MDMA, of which there was the largest quantity, as the lead offence. He treated it as aggravated by the other counts, and passed the same sentence on counts 1 and 2 to reflect totality. He gave appropriate credit for the plea in respect of the Ketamine conspiracy in the light of the jury's findings. It is therefore clear that the 14-year sentence passed in respect of count 3 and the concurrent 14-year sentences passed on counts 1 and 2 reflected all the criminality involved and the size of the operation, bearing in mind that the sole instance of intercepted importation, the fourth known trip, involved ten times the indicative quantities of drugs in the guidelines.[16]On the appellant's behalf, Ms Bald submits that his role was properly characterised as significant rather than leading because in truth it was confined to operational or logistical management: sourcing drivers, facilitating travel and making arrangements to collect the drugs. Such influence as he had over the drivers was limited and functional and did not amount to the degree of control or influence over the wider chain envisaged by the leading role category in the guidelines. She submitted that there had been a mis-categorisation because of a conflation of his role with the large commercial amount of the drugs that were intercepted. There was no evidence, she said, that he directed or organised the buying or selling of the drugs on a commercial scale.[17]Ms Bald contended, moreover, that the judge placed undue weight on the suggestion of substantial financial advantage, when there was no evidence of a lavish lifestyle, substantial assets or direct receipt of large profits. Indeed, the financial material before the court demonstrated significant personal indebtedness. In April 2024 the appellant owed almost £10,000 to the local council, and debt collectors were seeking to recover just over £3,000 from him. In July 2024 he owed HMCTS almost £3,000 for non-domestic rates and there was just under £1,500 due in respect of council tax. That information, however, related to a period that was more than six months after Valentino was arrested and the conspiracy had been disrupted.[18]In our judgment the trial judge, who was best placed to evaluate the role that the appellant played in these conspiracies, was entitled to find some elements of both leading and significant roles and to reflect this in the sentence that he passed. However, and in any event, the submissions made on the appellant's behalf ignore the fact that he was being sentenced for three class A conspiracies and one class B conspiracy in which the amounts of drugs were well in excess of those in the guidelines and there were three other trips before the one in which Valentino was intercepted. In those circumstances, a lengthy sentence was inevitable. Even if the judge had started at 10 years, there could have been no quarrel with an overall tariff of 14 years for four conspiracies of this nature, even after such limited personal mitigation as there was had been taken into account.[19]Ms Bald realistically recognised that the second ground of appeal was in essence a plea for clemency. She pointed out that three of the children are still very young. The appellant's wife would be left to manage on her own at a time when the three children would be at an important stage of their development, and they would effectively be prevented from having any meaningful contact with their father. In in her oral submissions this morning Ms Bald said that any reduction, however small, to the overall tariff would be of significance in that context.[20]Attractively though that submission was presented to us, the complaint that the judge failed to mention the impact of the appellant's incarceration on his four small children is of little substance in the context of offending of this seriousness. It is clear from the sentencing remarks that the judge had well in mind that the appellant is a family man and that he had read all the character references, which speak among other matters of his devotion to his children. However, he is not their sole carer. A lengthy custodial sentence was clearly merited and the effect that this would have on the children, even the younger children, counts for very little in this context. It is something the appellant should have thought about before he embarked upon offending of this nature.[21]These sentences cannot be described as wrong in principle. They are plainly not manifestly excessive. With our gratitude to Ms Bald for the way in which she presented the arguments on behalf of the appellant, this appeal is therefore dismissed. Epiq Europe Ltd hereby certify that the above is an accurate and complete record of the proceedings or part thereof. Lower Ground Floor, 46 Chancery Lane, London, WC2A 1JE Tel No: 020 7404 1400 Email: rcj@epiqglobal.co.uk