Dealer arrested after Colchester drug deaths in May jailed

Sabrino Hajderaj was spotted by police officers patrolling Cowdray Avenue in May following four deaths related to heroin overdoses in eight days.

After seeing a police car Hajderaj, 20, disappeared into shrubs and was pursued by police who arrested him and found him with more than £2,000 of class A drugs and a knife.

Jailed - Sabrino Hajderaj will spend two years in a young offenders' institution for drug dealing and knife possession (Image: Essex Police)

Ipswich Crown Court heard on Thursday how Hajderaj, who came to the UK from Albania in 2017, was selling illicit substances so he could repay a debt he owed to drug dealers.

A report which was prepared by the probation service for a previous conviction suggested Hajderaj glamourised drug lords Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ and Pablo Escobar.

In the week before Hajderaj was arrested, four people died from suspected drug overdoses which sparked a major police crackdown on dealers and county line operations.

When Hajderaj – who was said to be a ‘runner’ in the drug operation, and therefore of lower culpability – was arrested, police found £400 in cash and wraps of crack cocaine and heroin worth £2,000.

A knife was also seized and Hajderaj, of Sunny Bank in Croydon, admitted two charges of possessing class A drugs with intent to supply and one charge of possessing a knife.

Probation officer Abbey Robertson read to the court a report which said Hajderaj “has a criminal attitude” and “talks passionately about drug cartels including ‘El Chapo’ and Escobar”.

It continued by saying he had an “aversive attitude to the government’s management of crime and surveillance – he is dismissive of the risks of crime, valuing money above all else”.

Callum Munday, mitigating, said Hajderaj has ADHD and autistic spectrum disorder, and was taken into the care system when he was 17.

Fixation - Ipswich Crown Court heard how Sabrino Hajderaj talked 'passionately' about drug lords (Image: Daniel Rees, Newsquest)

He said: “He has been in the company of the wrong sorts of people.

“He says he just wants to move out of the area from where he was living when he was remanded so he can get away from people with whom he has been associated.”

Hajderaj, who appeared via video link from HMP Chelmsford, was jailed by His Honour Recorder Thomas Moran for four years in a young offenders’ institution, and will serve half his sentence before being released on licence.