Fake piano 'drug smuggling plot'

Five men plotted to bring drugs worth millions of pounds into the UK in hollow furniture and fake pianos, the Old Bailey has heard.

It is alleged police overheard the plan via a listening device put in a property in Battersea, south London.

Drugs were then seized in south London and Birmingham last year.

Jasraj Singh, 39, of Birmingham, James Ward, 53, of Kent, Gary Vian, 45, and Paul Woods, 31, of south London, and Terrence Pyne, 49, deny drugs charges.

Mukul Chawla, prosecuting, told the court that the police overheard conversations saying the men wanted to bring amphetamines, cocaine and other drugs in a piano from Holland.

Money in boiler

He said: "These defendants are drug dealers on a commercial scale."

The court heard the first seizure of drugs was 60 kilos of cannabis resin in Croydon, south-east London, in March last year.

The second was nine kilos of cocaine at the home of Mr Singh in Harborne, Birmingham, last July.

It is alleged £20,000 was also found hidden in a boiler at his house.

Two men have admitted the charge of conspiracy to supply cocaine which the five others deny.

The case continues.