A FORMER Hull takeaway owner is starting a 19-year prison sentence for being the "eyes and ears" of a £9m heroin smuggling plot.
Father-of-one Usman Bari, 33, was best known for running the popular Mamma Mia Takeaway, in Longhill, east Hull, and was respected for helping young men in city boxing gyms.
But to the police and courts, he was one of five drug smugglers responsible for "flooding the streets" with a substance that brings misery to the lives of thousands.
Bari, of Middleton Court, off Spring Bank, was sentenced, along with four others, at Leeds Crown Court to a collective jail term of 109 years.
Sentencing, Judge Christopher Batty said: "Heroin is a highly dangerous, addictive substance.
"People who peddle it can expect long sentences. Those who import it and flood the streets of this country with it can expect to go to prison for even longer."
Bari's sentence – the lesser of the four men – has shocked his community.
One man, who did not want to be named, but knew of him through the Hull Mosque and Islamic Centre, told the Mail Bari had been trying to be a better person.
He said: "He used to come here, sit quietly, say his prayers and go. I heard what he had done from his friends.
"They said he was trying to correct his mistakes and, for the past two years, had become a better person because he had a family.
"I feel sad about it and sympathy for his family."
Bari was found guilty of conspiracy to import class A drugs, conspiracy to supply and conspiracy to launder the proceeds.
Judge Batty described him as the "eyes and ears" of the operation, which saw £8.9m of heroin smuggled into the UK in bottles of baby powder sent through the post.
The parcels were originally sent from post offices in Bradford to Pakistan, using a recorded or tracked service.
There, accomplices would replace the contents with plastic bottles of Johnson's baby powder, which had heroin packages inside, and send them back to Hull, marked "undelivered – return to sender".
Bari was the main link between each drug gang in Bradford and Hull, which included local men, Paul Cahalin and Alan Riley.
Riley and Cahalin were jailed for a total of 20 years for their role in the same operation in 2012.
A "follow on" investigation by the Regional Organised Crime Unit officers during Operation Yates uncovered numerous telephone links between Bari and Cahalin.
Sentencing Bari, Judge Batty said he had heard "glowing" references, speaking of his work with young men in boxing gyms in Hull, but was satisfied of his involvement.
