Man jailed for drug dealing and money laundering

A man who was previously prosecuted in Northern Ireland's biggest ever money laundering case has been jailed after he admitted a string of fresh offences.

Rory Trainor played a "leading role" in the drugs trade and the convicted money launderer has a "high-risk of reoffending," Londonderry Crown Court was told.

The 48-year-old from Dunbrae, Newry, was among hundreds of UK suspects arrested after European police infiltrated the EncroChat system.

Trainor was given a five and a half year sentence - half of it to be served in jail - after he pleaded guilty to 38 charges including drug dealing and money laundering.

At the same court on Tuesday, another suspect who was arrested after the EncroChat sting was also jailed.

Criminal gangs around the world had been using the encrypted messaging service in the mistaken belief it was inaccessible to law enforcement agencies.

Trainor's EncroChat phone was never found but the police were able to link him to messages in which several drug deals and other criminality were being plotted.

The judge said Trainor had shown a "willing involvement" in the financing of serious and organised crime.

The Newry man was accused of laundering or conspiring to launder more than £1.3m in cash in a series of EncroChat communications with codenamed suspects.

The largest single sum he was accused of conspiring to launder was £227,435, but several of the offences involved sums of £100,000 or more.

Trainor also admitted being concerned in the supply of Class A and Class B drugs, namely cocaine and cannabis.

The offences all took place between March and June 2020 - shortly after the EncroChat decryption breakthrough was shared with UK police forces.

The court heard Trainor used two different pseudonyms on the messaging system - Barnbrack and Genghis Khan.

His co-conspirators were referred to in the charges by their nicknames only, which included Knucklehead, Squarerevolver, Snailmallet and Restless.

The judge told Londonderry Crown Court the decrypted messages "provided a digital fingerprint" of Trainor's life.

Pictures of his house and his home gym were identified in the Encrochat data.

The judge sentenced Trainor to four years for the drugs offences and 18 months for the money laundering offences.

He ordered the terms should be served consecutively, giving a total sentence of five-and-a-half years, but only half will be spent in prison.

Trainor has been in custody on remand since October 2023.

EncroChat was a secretive communication network in which users could exchange encrypted messages on mobile phones that they believed police could not infiltrate.

Users obtained modified mobile handsets in which microphones, cameras and GPS systems had been removed.

However, French and Dutch police managed to decode EncroChat's encryption system during the first Covid lockdown in 2020.

They then shared the data with international police forces via Europol, including the UK National Crime Agency (NCA).

In response, the NCA began to monitor and then arrest hundreds of suspects who had used EncroChat to arrange drug deals and other crimes.

The investigation was codenamed Operation Venetic, which the NCA described at the time as "the UK's biggest ever law enforcement operation".

More than a decade has passed since Trainor was prosecuted for his role in one of the biggest money laundering cases to ever come before a Northern Ireland court.

He previously ran a bureau de change business on the Dublin Road in Newry which he used to launder millions of pounds for drug dealers and other criminals.

More than £63m passed through his small office in the space of two-and-a-half years and Trainor was put under surveillance by revenue and customs officers.

Covert footage filmed by HMRC showed Trainor handing over a bag filled with cash to a convicted drug dealer in a west Belfast car park.

Trainor's Newry home was also raided twice by HMRC officers during the original investigation into his bureau de change business dealings.

More than £150,000 in cash was discovered hidden in a floor safe and a beer cooler in his property at that time.

Prosecutors also established he had used a stolen identity to move money to bank accounts in Bulgaria.

At that time, Trainor pleaded guilty converting the proceeds of crime for several criminal gangs, primarily drug dealers.

Despite pleading guilty to laundering what amounted to several million pounds, he walked free from court in 2014.

Instead of a custodial sentence, Trainor was made the subject of a serious crime prevention order.

The judge in that case deferred the sentence for a year to see if Trainor would comply with the order.

He was then given a suspended sentence in 2015.

The previous case was cited by the prosecution on Tuesday as an example of why Trainor posed a "high risk of reoffending".

The judge referred to pre-sentence reports in which Trainor said he "was drinking heavily" at the time of the offences in 2020.

He also said Trainor had been cooperating well with prison rehabilitation programme while on remand and had been "handpicked" by prison officers to work as a gym orderly.

A second man arrested after the EncroChat sting, Bobby Morrison Smyth from Victoria Street in Ballymoney, admitted a total of 10 charges including possessing cocaine with intent to supply.

He also pleaded guilty to being concerned in the supply of cocaine as well as criminal property offences that occurred on dates between March and April 2020.

One of the charges related to possessing 625g of cocaine.

The judge said Smyth acted as a middle man in the drug enterprise but became "a regular user" of cocaine.

The court heard that the defendant's role involved significant quantities of drugs' and was done for financial gain.

Judge Rafferty said the offences "were not a one off" and Smyth was "involved in a criminal organisation dealing in class A drugs for a period if time".

He sentenced Smyth to four years, with half to be served in custody and half on licence.