Prison 'Suicide risk' drug dealer suffered machete attack

Jacob Sealey was jailed for four and half years for dealing crack cocaine and heroin in Worcester, his runners operating on the doorstep of the city's Cathedral as the County Lines gang used hotels including Travelodge and Premier Inn as bases. Siobhan Collins, prosecuting, said: "All four defendants were caught red-handed having been involved in this criminal enterprise."

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The 23-year-old was jailed at Worcester Crown Court last Thursday despite lengthy pleas from his advocate for the judge not to send Sealey to jail because of his mental health issues.

JAILED: Jacob Sealey. Photo: West Mercia Police

But the judge told Sealey he had been able to make 'perfectly rational decisions' when dealing class A drugs across county boundaries.

Sealey admitted conspiracy to supply crack cocaine and heroin in Worcester between July 12 and 24, 2018. The court heard how Sealey and other, younger members of the group, had been bringing drugs to Worcester from Coventry and selling them to users, sometimes travelling back to Coventry to restock.

'VULNERABLE': Jacob Sealey according to his advocate is vulnerable.

The defendant also admitted being in possession of diamorphine (heroin), a class A drug, with intent to supply in Northumberland Road, Coventry on February 1, 2017. He was found with 29 wraps of heroin and two mobile phones after running from police. He had been on bail for that offence when he started dealing in Worcester.

In total officers seized 99 wraps of crack cocaine and 46 of heroin near Worcester Cathedral. Sealey's fingerprints were on the bag containing the bulk of the drugs, the court heard.

Although Sealey of March Way, Coventry, was not arrested outside the Cathedral, police pulled him over in a Chevrolet where he was found to have £660 in cash behind the driver's sun visor. Sealey tried to claim he had just offered the other two dealers found in the car a lift, denied any involvement in possession of drugs with intent and said the money was from a car he had sold.

Paul Williams, defending, said the case was 'serious' but also 'unusual', asking the sentence of imprisonment to be suspended but this argument was ultimately rejected by Judge Nicolas Cartwright.

FIRM: Judge Nicolas Cartwright said drugs bring poor health and potentially death to users and also lead to crime.

"He has extreme difficulties and complex communication and processing issues" said Mr Williams.

He stressed that his client had been referred to mental health services in February 2018. "This is not a case one just takes at face value - it's much more difficult than that" he said.

Mental health issues included, Mr Williams said, 'episodes of psychosis'. Reports made reference to schizophrenia and auditory hallucinations.

"It's difficult to see him as the same person that was involved in the original drug supply. The reports show a man that has clearly been unwell for several years" he said.

Mr Williams said the family had now moved away from Coventry to 'get away from the dreadful stress and actual violence which has been visited upon him and friends and family'.

"He received injuries from a machete to the back of his head" he said.

He added: "If he were sent to immediate custody he might well end up committing suicide - he's vulnerable." His client had been on an electronic tag since March last year.

Sealey's grandfather had also died and the funeral was due to be held next week. Judge Cartwright said Sealey's basis of plea in relation to the Warwick indictment - that he ran up a drug debt and, in order to pay it off, began dealing drugs and had been threatened with violence was never accepted by the Crown. He said if people secured drugs on credit, as Sealey said he had, it was 'perfectly obvious that they were going to enforce the debt' and ask him to work it off. Judge Cartwright told Sealey he had entered into 'a voluntary arrangement'.

"If they turn nasty, which drug dealers have a reputation for doing, then of course it's some mitigation in particular where threats are made to people who are not directly part of this pact like family."

However, he said: "The weight such mitigation has will be reduced considerably because it's all self-inflicted."

The judge also told Sealey it was an aggravating feature that he was 'controlling younger, vulnerable people as your runners' and had been on court bail for the Warwickshire offences at the time he was supplying drugs in Worcester.

He added: "Drug use, as everybody knows, brings unhappiness, misery, health problems and sometimes death to the users."