He was 'like a ghost'... then he went to a Man City game

A major drugs kingpin - described by police as 'a highly sophisticated and professional international trafficker' - was finally arrested as he prepared to watch Manchester City play Liverpool at Anfield.

Robert Bennett, 50, was described by the National Crime Agency as 'ghost-like'. They said he left 'little trace' and 'managed to stay off the radar for a long time'. But justice has now caught up with him and he's behind bars serving a 19-year prison sentence.

NCA officers swooped to arrest him on October 3, 2021, as he walked into Anfield to watch Liverpool play Manchester City in the Premier League.

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The agency said Bennett, from Wigan, was involved in the smuggling, or discussions around possible smuggling, of more than a ton of cocaine into Liverpool. Known by the handle 'Dior Six' on the encrypted communications platform EncroChat, he worked with offenders based abroad and in the UK to traffick cocaine, the NCA said.

A spokesman said: "He used corrupt insiders at the Port of Liverpool to break out drugs from shipping containers and used foreign contacts to help him orchestrate the smuggling of drugs by road from Europe. In April 2020, Bennett and another EncroChat user successfully brought 97kg of cocaine into the UK, driven from the Netherlands.

"His Encrochat messages suggested he had successfully smuggled 150kg of cocaine into Liverpool's docks from Guayaquil in Ecuador and was discussing another possible 500kg attempt with the South Americans.

"Evidence showed he was also involved in other discussions to smuggle through the docks: 200kg of cocaine from Colombia; between 200kg and 300kg at a cost of 7,500 Euros per kg from Costa