ONE of Sheffield’s major drug dealers who ran a crack and heroin den which made him a quarter of a million pounds a year has had his jail term cut.
Aly Anderson, aged 54, ran a ‘fortified drugs supermarket’ selling Class A drugs on Swanbourne Road, Sheffield Lane Top.
His 24-hour operation came to light after the death of Damian Taff, 29, who was stabbed to death outside in 2010.
Mr Taff, a dad-of-three from Grimesthorpe, was knifed through the heart in revenge for robbing another customer after visiting the den for a fix. His killer, Benjamin Grant, then 31, of Shiregreen, was jailed for 27 years.
Anderson, who ran the den, was in Spain at the time of Mr Taff’s murder, but officers arrested him when he returned to Sheffield a week later. He was jailed for 20 years after being convicted of conspiracy to supply Class A drugs.
But Anderson went to London’s Appeal Court to challenge the length of his sentence - and judges agreed it was ‘excessive’. It was cut by two years to 18.
Although not at the top of the hierarchy, Anderson was said to be ‘at the very heart’ of the network trading narcotics from the fortified garage on Swanbourne Road, which had a reinforced steel door that could be opened from the inside only.
Customers were vetted by CCTV and security was provided by three ferocious pit bull terriers. Addicts put their money into a tube before the dealers delivered the heroin and crack back through another tube.
The court heard Anderson made ‘substantial profits’ from his dealings.
Anderson, known in the drugs world as ‘Bagpuss’, has convictions dating back to the 1970s for offences including dishonesty and drugs.
His son, Danny Hockenhull, 28, of Hawkshead Road, Grimesthorpe, is serving life behind bars for the murder of 23-year-old Brett Blake, who was stabbed to death in a Sheffield nightclub in 2008 as part of a postcode gang war.
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