Two Brighton drug dealers now in prison for selling cocaine are to be stripped of £20,000 in illegal profits.
Fisnik Derguti, 33, and Flora Mahmood, 31, were caught when Derguti threw a packet of cocaine out of his car window.
Derguti had been pulled over by a police officer for not giving way when pulling out of East Street into King’s Road in Brighton.
Minutes later other units arrived to assist the officer to restrain Derguti. Officers searched the area and found two amounts of white compacted powder and a large lump of powder covered in cling film.
More drugs were found in the road behind Derguti.
He was arrested for possession with intent to supply and taken to custody where he was extremely evasive, refusing to provide address details, claiming not to remember where he lived and claiming not to live at the address on his driving licence.
Police then went to his address. As officers knocked on the front door, others at the rear of the address heard rustling and saw an object being thrown into the neighbouring garden.
They went into the garden and saw Flora Mahmood with an envelope of cash in her hand.
A second envelope split open in a fence of the neighbouring garden had dispersed £50 notes. Also in the garden was a Lidl bag containing six blocks of powder.
A search of the premises revealed a further block of powder, £22,280 cash, plastic bags, mobile phones and financial documents.
Derguti, believed to be Albanian, and Mahmood, believed to be Bulgarian, both of Normans Court, Downsway, Shoreham, were sentenced in October, Derguti to five years and Mahmood to four years.
Sussex Police financial investigators then put together a financial case against both under the Proceeds of Crime Act.
And on Friday (10 December) an order was made by Brighton Crown Court that £23,152.16 be confiscated from the pair, each effectively having to pay half that amount.
They would each also be subject to a further 18 months in prison if they default on payment while remaining liable for payment.
Detective Inspector Chris Neilson, of the Sussex Police Economic Crime Unit, said: “This case shows once again that alert officers on the street play a vital role in disrupting local drug supply.
“It also shows that wherever possible we will relentlessly pursue criminals even beyond their sentences to strip them of their illicit profits and plough them back into the real community and law enforcement.”
