Tanzir Ali: Sheffield drug line 'king' posed with gun to send 'threats of war' to rival dealers

A criminal involved with the Sheffield ‘Twister’ drug phone line sent a picture of himself posing with a firearm to send ‘threats of war’ to rival dealers. 

The image sent by 23-year-old Tanzir Ali was uncovered by police after they raided his property and found £14,000 of Class A and Class B drugs, along with bundles of cash totalling £4,181, eight mobile phones and a variety of weapons ‘associated with the supply of drugs,’ Sheffield Crown Court heard. 

Ali sent the image with ‘threats of war’ to other drug dealers and claimed he, through his ‘Twister’ drug supply line, was the ‘mother f***ing king’. 

Prosecuting barrister, Tim Savage, said the firearm Ali posed with was not found during the police search, however, Sheffield Crown Court heard today (August 1, 2023).

In total, police found 86 grams of cocaine, with an estimated street value of £8,450; 24 grams of heroin worth £2,440; 28 grams of ketamine worth £840 and 59 grams of cannabis worth £520.

“The drugs were all, in the main, packaged for sale on the streets,” Mr Savage said. 

Mr Savage told the court that police ‘raided’ Ali’s Sheffield property on August 30, 2022 after connecting the Twister drug phone line to his address. 

A number of weapons that the judge, Recorder Simon Kealey KC described as being ‘associated with drug supply’ were found at Ali’s address, including a knife, a Co2 gun; extendable baton, as well as two ‘stab vests’. 

Prosecutor Mr Savage said the mobile phones recovered from Ali’s premises contained messages ‘clearly referring to the sale of drugs over three to four months’ and the phones were also being used to send out regular drug ‘advertisements’. 

“It’s clear the defendant was controlling others selling drugs on his behalf,” Mr Savage told the court, adding that it is the prosecution’s case that he had an ‘intermediate role’ in the drug supply chain.  

Ali, of HMP Hull, pleaded guilty to two counts of possessing a Class A drug, namely cocaine and heroin, with intent to supply; and two counts of possessing a Class B drug, namely cannabis and ketamine, with intent to supply, at an earlier hearing. 

Graham Rishton, defending, said this case, ‘in many ways is a tragedy’ because Ali is a young man who previously held a clean criminal record, and is from a ‘loving and supportive family’. 

“Which, notwithstanding the appalling criminality Your Honour has to sentence him for, they think very highly of him. He recognises he only has himself to blame for the predicament he now finds himself in,” Mr Rishton told Recorder Kealey. 

He continued: “He is genuinely remorseful for his actions. He realises he has utterly shamed himself, and his family, for behaving in the way he has.”

Mr Rishton said the regret Ali feels for missing his ‘father’s final days’ while in prison on remand for these offences will ‘stay with him forever’. 

Recorder Kealey jailed Ali for four years, and told him: “This was an established drugs business. You controlled others in the running of a drugs line.”