£1m drugs raid crime boss left 'looking over shoulder for rest of life'

AXE AND MACHETE THUGS TARGETED STASH HOUSE OF NOTORIOUS GANG

- ANDREW BARDSLEY

THE boss of a Salford crime family will have to ‘look over his shoulder’ for ‘most of the rest of his life’ after plotting the audacious robbery of a notorious Liverpool gang.

Jason Cox joined forces with Liverpudlian criminal Richard Caswell to storm a stash house operated by an organised crime group based in the city, which Cox described as the ‘biggest firm in Liverpool’.

Cox, his brother Craig Cox and Caswell burst into the stash house, on a residential street in Liverpool, on a Saturday morning after another robber pretended to be a delivery driver and knocked on the front door. When they burst in, a father and a son inside the house were slashed and attacked with an axe and machete.

Moments later, the robbers fled with about 30 kilos of cocaine, worth up to £1 million and left a ‘trail of blood in their wake’, Manchester Crown Court heard.

As he was jailed for almost 15 years, Jason Cox’s lawyer said he will now have to ‘look over his shoulder’ for ‘most of the rest of his life’.

Caswell’s lawyer said he is under threat in prison and has become a ‘target’. He was reportedly ‘slashed’ in prison previously.

Jason Cox has now been sentenced to 14 years and eight months in prison. His brother was sentenced to 13-and-a-half years and Caswell, nicknamed ‘Will’ because of an apparent resemblance to pop star Will Young, received seven years.