Simon Dutton, 49, from Bolton, has been named by the National Crime Agency as part of a drive to flush out fugitives believed to be hiding in Spain. The agency says he is believed to be behind large shipments of cocaine sent from Spain to the UK.
The release of Dutton's details comes as officers step up pressure on suspects thought to be living among British ex-pat communities while continuing to offend. The NCA said it believes the UK's 12 most-wanted fugitives are in Spain, and Dutton is one of them.
The campaign is aimed at people the agency says have tried to blend in with expats while staying active in crime. Rick Jones said they generally integrate themselves into these communities, which are populated by many thousands of British people who may be enjoying retirement or running businesses there. That, investigators say, makes them harder to find and easier to overlook.
Dutton is also linked to a broader pattern of cases the NCA says involve fugitives wanted for murder, fraud and money laundering. The agency's warning comes with a practical reason: one intercepted consignment tied to Spanish-based trafficking contained 10.5kg of cocaine with a street value of £1.5m, a haul that shows the scale of the trade it is trying to disrupt.
The list also points back to some of the most serious violence in Britain over the past two decades. Among the cases connected to the wider hunt are the June 2004 shooting of 16-year-old Liam Kelly in Dingle, Liverpool, the August 2005 killing of 22-year-old Lucy Hargreaves in Walton, and the June 2007 shooting of 49-year-old Thomas Cameron in Glasgow. Each name is now part of the push to pin down suspects the NCA says have slipped abroad.
What makes the campaign urgent is not just that the suspects are said to be living in Spain, but that they may still be operating from there. The agency's message is clear: the ex-pat cover that once helped these men disappear is now being used against them, and the next lead could come from within the communities they tried to join.
