You got to respect.a man who loves his dog, but that aside, some gangsters are too clueless to
survive long on the streets. And just like dogs, sometimes bite off more than they can chew
The boss of this criminal organization unwittingly betrayed his entire operation — on two continents —
and lost nearly a half ton of high-purity ecstasy by foolishly texting an unfortunate
photo of his pooch. He thought his chats with fellow gangsters were impenetrable, on a cool
encrypted phone. His username there was "RollTheDice." Yeah, he nailed it. The Mob Reporter here with
all the details of a headline grabbing underworld tale, that turned into a screwball comedy. Bumbling
British gangsters undone by careless dog pics and inadvertent selfies. Let me tell you about it
Meet Bob. I'm sure he's a good boy. Bob is a French Bulldog apparently beloved by a man
who was hammering out a complicated plot to move $54 million in high demand drugs
halfway around the world. He and his gang were using a supposedly secret phone system called
EncroChat — and why not, all the cool narcos were using it. Which was exactly why penetrating it
became a global police priority. When French cops finally breached the system in 2020, it revealed
gangland plots being hatched all over the world. Including in Bromley, southeast London, where Danny
Brown lived with Bob. Brown, 53 at the time, seemed smitten with his pooch. So much so that in between
messages about their 448 kilo load of ecstasy, he sent a photo of Bob to his gangmate Stefan
Baldauf, a 60-year-old German living in England. He sent this photo. When investigators sifting through
EncroChat chatter saw Bob, they didn't just see a dog. They saw a dog tag. And looking closely, they
saw something on the tag that no gangster should ever be sending. Brown's phone number was on that
tag. You can't see it here because prosecutors blurred the number before releasing this photo
This wasn't the only photo gaffe the gang made. They carelessly photobombed their own photos
Baldauf's salt-and-pepper hair is seen in the reflection on a shiny metal address sign in
this photo he sent on EncroChat. his handle there was "BoldMove." Indeed it was. Brown was
no better. His bald head and arched eyebrows can be seen in this photo reflected in the bottom
corner of his TV screen. At least it shows he takes horizontal photos. I hope the judge took
that into consideration. These photos weren't just silly mistakes. They were fatal flaws. All
of it proved that these men had control of the EncroChat phones that were arranging the drugs
The ecstasy was worth close to US$22 million in Britain, police said. But could
go for $54 million if they could get it sold on the streets of Australia. They had
a plan to get it there. They first paid US$80 000 for a huge excavator. Another member
of the gang, Leon Reilly, 48, had a construction equipment company in Ireland and used that as
cover to arrange for the digger to be moved from Leeds, in the north of England, down south, to an
industrial unit in Essex, which was arranged by another accomplice, Tony Borg, 42. It was
57-year-old Peter Murray's job to get the drugs, and Philip Lawson, 59, designed the hiding spots
He bought a high-end welder, cut a hole into the boom arm of the dgger, lined the hiding
spots with lead, and dropped in the E. The hole was resealed, repainted, and a signed company was
paid to make large stickers to cover the weld lines. The digger was packed and ready to go in
December 2020. Reilly's company was used to pay a haulage firm to move it to England's Southampton
Docks, and then ship it by sea. It took seven weeks to make the journey to Brisbane, Australia. Their
cover story was they were exporting it to sell it. They even set up an online auction to make it
look legit. They rigged it so the people they were shipping it to would be the winning bid
They had a scare midway through. The auction attracted other potential bidders. Reilly sent
Brown a warning on EncroChat: "There are six people watching it," he said
"F'ing hell that's not good is it" Brown texted back. None of that mattered in the end
When the digger arrived in Brisbane, Australian Border Force officers x-rayed it and spotted the
extra load, despite the lead shield. They cracked it open, removed 226 packages of MDMA, slipped
an electronic tracker inside, resealed it, and sent it on its way to its originally intended
destination, which was an auction house in Sydney. The buyer was a Sydney man in the construction
industry, authorities allege. He first used the excavator to dig a trench and then drove the
digger down into it. It obscured sight lines to what was going on. For three days in May, two men
searched inside that digger. Lawson sent them a hand-drawn diagram of where the drug should
be and instructions on how to get them out. The Aussies allegedly sent back a photo of the hollow
arm of the digger. They soon realized something had gone amuck. EncroChat messages captured a
frantic six-way chat trying to figure out who had taken the drugs. They assumed they had been stolen
When the secrecy of EncroChat was breached, law enforcement agencies in several countries were
able to spy on millions of messages between criminals. While investigators could read the
messages, the biggest challenge was putting real identities to the usernames — and that's
where careless pics of Bob and unwitting selfies sank this gang. The British and Australian ends
of the plot were both arrested in 2022: 10 men were pinched in all. During raids in Australia
police seized A$1.2 million in cash. In London, Brown was carrying his EncroChat phone
when arrested. Baldauf's phone was in his car. And when investigators searched Brown's home
Bob the dog was there watching. I hope the cops gave him a biscuit. The suspect's lawyers fought
mightily in court to have the EncroChat data ruled inadmissible as evidence. That's partly
why these trials have taken so long. They failed. A jury convicted six men in Britain. Two others were
cleared. The Australian charges have not yet been settled. On December 6, 2022, the British gang was
sentenced to hefty prison terms: 28 and 26 years for ringleaders, Baldauf and Brown; 24 years each
for Murray, the supplier, and Rieley, the company owner; 23 years for Lawson, the mechanic; and 15
years for Borg, who helped move the digger. You could say they dug themselves a very deep hole
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