Football prodigy Jamie Cassidy, who once played alongside Premier League stars like Michael Owen, last month pleaded guilty to involvement in the international racket alongside his 50-year-old brother, Jonathan Cassidy, from Crosby in Merseyside. A third man, Nasar Ahmed, from Bury, also admitted his role.
He was sentenced on Thursday. Manchester Crown Court heard Cassidy had been involved in industrial scale importation of cocaine, which was shipped across the Atlantic to the Netherlands before being smuggled to Liverpool in modified vehicles and distributed across the UK.
Cassidy was arrested following the collapse of the EncroChat network, an encrypted communication system used by organised criminals. French intelligence services cracked the encryption code in summer 2020, and passed details on to the UK National Crime Agency. He was sentenced alongside Jonathan, 50, who headed the operation.
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Jamie Cassidy has been jailed for 13 years and 3 months
