Exploring the role of the British Transport Police in responding to ‘County Lines’ drug markets: Enforcement and safeguarding perspectives
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X20902810 |
| Author | Michael Blakeburn,Richard Smith |
| Date | 01 June 2021 |
| Published date | 01 June 2021 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
Exploring the role of the
British Transport Police in
responding to ‘County
Lines’ drug markets:
Enforcement and
safeguarding perspectives
Michael Blakeburn
British Transport Police, London, UK
Richard Smith
Metropolitan Police Service, London, UK
Abstract
This article considers ‘County Lines’ drug markets, specifically in the context of the
interventions available to the British Transport Police to deal with this damaging criminal
modality. Further, this article identifies the active role the organisation is playing
in protecting the interests of vulnerable people. Through a review of contemporary
literature and a qualitative empirical study involving influential practitioners in the field,
this article identifies that encouraging steps are being taken to deal with this complex
problem and that the sharing of information between agencies remains one of the key
challenges to overcome.
Keywords
County lines, safeguarding, drug supply, partnership working, gangs, youth violence
Introduction
A growing consideration within criminal justice discourse, particularly for practitioners
seeking to implement safeguarding measures to protect vulnerable young people, is that
Corresponding author:
Richard Smith, Metropolitan Police Service, London, UK.
Email: richardsmith100@hotmail.com
The Police Journal:
Theory, Practice and Principles
2021, Vol. 94(2) 239–256
ªThe Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/0032258X20902810
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of ‘County Lines’. This refers to inner city street level drug dealing expanding into rural/
county areas to take advantage of new markets. A nomenclature that is frequently
misunderstood, the ‘county’ perspective references the geographical markets to where
new drug trade operations are being directed. The ‘line’ aspect refers to the mobile phone
lines, managed by inner city gangs, controlling drug distribution. Drug related crimin-
ality, with many of the characteristics of what law enforcement agencies refer to today as
county lines, is not new. However, when the National Crime Agency (NCA) established
the Home Office commissioned ‘Gang and Youth Violence Team’, distinguishing
aspects of this particular crime trend were identified and the term ‘county lines’ was
established to initiate the collaborative approach required to combat this growing prob-
lem (NCA, 2015).
The explanation of County Lines provided by the NCA is used to frame this article
and is as follows:
County Lines is a term used when drug gangs from big cities expand their operations to
smaller towns, often using violence to drive out local dealers and exploiting children and
vulnerable people to sell drugs. These dealers will use dedicated mobile phone lines, known
as ‘deal lines’, to take orders from drug users. Heroin, cocaine and crack cocaine are the
most common drugs being supplied and ordered. In most instances, the users or customers
will live in a different area to where the dealers and networks are based, so drug runners are
needed to transport the drugs and collect payment. (NCA, 2019)
While other variations on this definition are provided by, for example, West Midlands
Police (WMP, 2019) or the Home Office (2018), the NCA view is relied upon because it
is found to be the most comprehensive of these definitions. Further, the NCA owns the
national coordination function for the response to County Lines and so its characterisa-
tion of the County Lines issue is the most appropriate description upon which to build
this article.
Criminal justice practitioners frequently present two hypotheses as to why these new
markets are now being accessed in this way. The first is simply one of economics. Drug
distribution markets in inner cities became saturated and competition so intense that the
gangs controlling the markets expanded their businesses into other areas where they saw
opportunity to make more money, more quickly. The second proposition is that the
evolution and maturity of policing tactics, for example, the Trident Gang Command
in London’s Metropolitan Police Service, has placed significant pressure on traditional
inner city drug markets, forcing diversification in drug supply tactics, to more rewarding
and more easily accessed markets. Arguably, it is a combination of both these factors that
has led to the profitable county lines model being established.
In the context of responding to this phenomenon, there are dual responsibilities placed
upon criminal justice agencies. While enforcement activity may attract the most obvious
attention, there is also a requirement for safeguarding tactics to be employed. Criminal
gangs use young people to traffic drugs and collect payment. These young people will
typically be vulnerable and coerced. They are often missing children and very much
victims themselves, subject to extreme violence and sexual exploitation (The Children’s
Society, 2018). It is this perspective which requires the police service and other partner
240 The Police Journal: Theory, Practice and Principles 94(2)
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