Heywood drug dealer who had over 14,000 contacts on mobile phone jailed

A young Heywood man has been jailed for four years for supplying crack cocaine and heroin to vulnerable users in Rochdale.

Selim Ahmed, 22, had more than 14,000 contacts on his mobile phone and advertised the supply of drugs in Heywood and Middleton.

Investigators found he sent text messages every day from August to November last year in his efforts to peddle drugs.

Greater Manchester Police said the text messages from his “Nokia 105 graft mobile phone” included “on, power fat sizes” and “new stuf, w nd gear! Firing one! On t late”.

Ahmed, who was arrested from a Cedar Avenue address in Heywood on November 16, admitted to being “concerned in the supply of crack cocaine and heroin and possession of a knife.”

His sentencing took place at Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court on Monday.

Greater Manchester Police’s County Lines Team detective sergeant Chris Woodburn said the young man was profiting from vulnerable people who were addicted to drugs.

Investigations revealed Ahmed would continually send text messages to thousands of his contacts “in the hope they would buy the drugs”, the sergeant said.

“Our job is to identify and target people like Ahmed to seize the ‘graft’ phone, so it is no longer active”, Woodburn said.

He asserted that the police would continue work to stop “drug dealers and organised crime groups from exploiting vulnerable people.”

Woodburn also appealed to members of the public to report any activity they believed could be related to drugs.