A DRUG dealer who stashed cocaine worth nearly £100,000 in his mother’s dirty laundry basket and a courier found with two working handguns have been jailed for a total of twelve-and-a-half years.

Callum Zimbler, 27, was arrested when armed police smashed down the front door of his mother’s home in Valley Road, Billericay, on October 25.

Basildon Crown Court heard officers had staked out the house and watched Bradley Small, 28, of Broomhills Chase, Little Burstead, dropping off a bag.

A short while later, a third man arrived and then left the property. He was stopped and found to be in possession of 50 wraps of cocaine.

Officers arrested Small and the other dealer and later returned to carry out the raid.

Small had been a wanted man since armed police raided a rented garage in Glebe End, Elsenham, on September 20.

The court heard Small, known as “Squeak” by the landlord, was working for a “serious organised crime group”.

He was hiding one kilogram of cocaine, two handguns, a silencer, a bottle of ammonia and about 200 rounds of 9mm ammunition in a portable safe in the garage.

Police found two bags hidden in a laundry basket in Zimbler’s mother’s bedroom- one contained 1.88 kilograms of the class A drug and the other £35,000 in cash.

Zimbler admitted possession with intent to supply cocaine and possession of criminal property in the form of cash.

He was jailed for a total of four-and-a-half years after the court heard he had a previous conviction for money laundering.

Small admitted possession with intent to supply cocaine and four firearms offences. He was jailed for a total of eight years.

Both hearings took place separately over videolink from prison.

Jonathan Tyler, mitigating for Zimbler, said the father-of-one wanted to make it clear his mother had no involvement in the offences and was on holiday at the time.

He said: “Mr Zimbler is a man who has got into something very much out of his depth. He’s never been involved in drugs before and has never been involved in anything of this level of seriousness.

“He has an awful lot he knows he will lose.”

Peter Edmunds, mitigating for Small, said the labourer had been “stupid” to get involved with serious criminals- who paid him about £500 a week- but said he was drawn in by a friend and his family was threatened.

He said: “Those who enter into an illusory glamorous world soon find the reality of it involves significant violence and a risk to the public.”

The court heard the father-of-two has previous convictions for grievous bodily harm with intent and robbery, but Mr Edmunds said he had been in the process of getting his life back on track.

Sentencing Zimbler, Judge Ian Graham said: “I’m told that you are full of remorse for what happened and you very much regret getting involved in the drugs word at this level.”

But he told Small that the matching handguns and ammunition had the potential to cause “enormous harm”.

He said: “The firearms were both in working order, they could both be fired, although they required some conversion.”