The corrupt drug dealing detective who dropped a bag of cocaine outside his daughter's primary school

A corrupt detective whose secret life as a drug dealer began to unravel when he dropped off cocaine outside his daughter's primary school has been jailed.

Andrew Talbot, 54, from Leigh, who worked in GMP's serious crime division, stole just under four kilos of cocaine from the GMP property store, before then supplying it between February 2018 and January 2020.

Talbot, a cocaine-addicted former army officer, conspired with a convicted drug dealer, Keith Bretherton, and used his position as a police officer to give him confidential force information to help him to recover a drug debt worth more than £20,000. He also searched the force's confidential computer systems for known or suspected drug dealers to help him shift the drugs he stole and provide information to a friend who was under investigation for assault.

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His crimes only began to unravel, however, when he dropped a small bag of cocaine outside his daughter’s primary school on February 13 2020, prompting a major investigation by GMP’s anti-corruption unit.

He was jailed for 19 years at Liverpool Crown Court on Friday. Judge Neil Flewitt KC told him: "As a former police officer, you knew the harm caused by the distribution of class A drugs that brought misery to those addicted to them and brought suffering to those decent people who were victims of crime committed by those addicts."

He added: "You deceived your colleagues and betrayed the trust placed in you by them and the community."

When searched at work three days after he unwittingly dropped the bag of cocaine at his daughter's school, he was found with more cocaine, with his car