Bolton: Duo dealt crack and heroin from Haydock Street flat

Rashid Nurein, 21 and Zakareya Abdullah, 19, were both just in their teens when they sold Class A drugs from a flat at the Croft, Haydock Street over a period of several months.

But they quickly came under the police’s spotlight and Bolton Crown Court heard how officers kept close watch on them.

Hannah Forsyth, prosecuting, said: “It became clear that drug users were attending the flat in order to purchase drugs.”

She told the court how the duo sold drugs between December 2020 and March 9 2021.

The duo had been dealing heroin and crack cocaine (Image: Newsquest)

Their illegal activities were brought to an abrupt end when police raided the flat on March 9 that year after securing a search warrant.

Ms Forsyth told the court how as police arrived, they saw items being thrown out of the window, which turned out to be crack cocaine, heroin and other drug paraphernalia, in an ‘unsophisticated’ attempt to conceal evidence.

The duo, who appeared in court via video link from Forest Bank Prison were arrested both eventually admitted to supplying Class A drugs at a plea hearing on April 9 last year.

But since then Nurein, of Rawcliffe Street, Manchester and Abdullah, of Halsby Road, Sale, had been through a long process as they awaited to be sentenced.

Robert Smith, defending Nurein, argued that his client deserved credit for having admitted to his crime and claimed he still had a good chance at rehabilitation.

Mr Smith pointed out that Nurein was “just short of his 20th birthday at the time” and had begun dealing as a way of working off a drugs debt.

He claimed that Nurein had been working at improving his education by doing course in prison since his arrest.

He had no previous convictions and planned to go back into legitimate work if released.

Alison Mather, defending Abdullah, told that her client had accepted responsibility for what he had done but had ‘grown in maturity’ since then.

She cited ‘glowing’ character references and said that Abdullah had suffered from traumatic events in his childhood but, like Nurein, was of ‘good character’ before becoming involved in dealing drugs with no previous convictions.

Judge Tom Gilbart accepted that both had been of good character before their involvement in drugs and that they deserved credit for having pleaded guilty.

He also acknowledged that their involvement was ‘relatively unsophisticated’ and that there was no evidence of them working in a chain.

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But Judge Gilbart reminded the court of the devastation that illegal drugs wreck on communities like Bolton.

He said: “Drugs such as these have a corrosive effect on society and this court room sees those effects on society on a daily basis.”

He sentenced Nurein to a total of 31 months in prison and Abdullah to 118 weeks.

But both had already served the equivalent of their time in custody while on remand and so were released to serve what was left of their sentences in the community.