Drug dealer served with Bedfordshire’s first Slavery and Trafficking Prevention Order

A drug dealer who trafficked two teenagers into a different county to sell drugs has been made subject to Bedfordshire’s first ever Slavery and Trafficking Prevention Order (STPO).

Schimarr Smith, 20, has been jailed for more than five years for running a county drugs line from Luton to Cambridgeshire.

In a first for Bedfordshire Police, the Judge also made Smith subject to a STPO after the court heard how he exploited two vulnerable boys, moving them across the region and placing them in drug dens so that they were easily accessible to his customers.

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Smith became a person of interest when police attended an address in Cambridge and discovered a boy with Class A drugs and a mobile phone.

After an investigation was launched, officers conducted a warrant at Runham Close in Luton where Smith was arrested alongside Dante Daley-Witter, 21.

In the property they found more than £2,000 cash, two bags of individually packaged deals of cocaine and heroin, phones, knives, and a stab proof vest.

Phone work completed by police analysts discovered Smith’s phone also co-located with the boys’ phones on numerous occasions, making the same journeys where the boys were transported by taxi from Luton to Cambridge and then left there.

During the sentencing on Thursday, March 28, 2024, His Honour Judge Johnson made note that although Smith had clearly been a victim of modern slavery himself when he was younger, he had chosen two boys ‘ripe for exploitation’ and done the same to them, choosing to perpetuate the cycle instead of breaking it.

Schimarr Smith of no fixed abode, pleaded guilty to two counts of modern-day slavery offences and conspiracy to supply cocaine and heroin. He was sentenced to serve five years and one month, initially to be served in a Young Offender Institution.

He was also made subject to an STPO for 10 years, preventing him from owning more than one mobile device, and most importantly from having any unsupervised contact or communication of with anyone under the age of 18.

Dante Daley-Witter, of Runham Close, Luton, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to supply cocaine, heroin and cannabis and was sentenced to two years and four months in prison.

Detective Sergeant Flaminia Romita, from Bedfordshire Police’s specialist Boson Guns and Gang Unit, said: “I’m pleased with the Judge’s stance and for granting the first STPO for Bedfordshire, which places strict conditions on Smith for a very long time. This has now set a precedent which we’ll use in our favour to protect young and vulnerable people from dangerous drug dealers like Smith.

“County lines gangs groom children by showering them with gifts, money and making them feel that they will be looked after. These tactics often mean the young person is then in their debt and will owe them favours, such as carrying weapons or selling drugs. They have no problem with putting a young person at risk to make money.

“I hope this result will be a warning to those who exploit children to deal drugs in our county and further afield that they will not go unpunished.”

For more information about county lines and the work we do visit our County Lines webpage.

The signs of a child being involved in criminal exploitation include:

• Regularly going missing
• Having expensive items like clothes, cash and trainers
• Lots of different mobile phones
• Relationships with older people
• Unexplained injuries
• Phrases like ‘going country’, ‘going crunch’, ‘trap house’, ‘plugging’ and ‘bando’
• Lots of train and bus tickets

For support for those involved in county lines visit the Beds Veru website.