‘Vulnerable’ Kids Going Country: Children and Young People’s Involvement in County Lines Drug Dealing
| Author | Leah Moyle,Ross Coomber,James Windle |
| DOI | 10.1177/1473225420902840 |
| Published date | 01 April 2020 |
| Date | 01 April 2020 |
| Subject Matter | Special Issue Articles |
902840YJJ0010.1177/1473225420902840Youth JusticeWindle et al.
research-article2020
Special Issue Article
Youth Justice
2020, Vol. 20(1-2) 64 –78
‘Vulnerable’ Kids Going Country:
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Involvement in County Lines
Drug Dealing
James Windle , Leah Moyle and Ross Coomber
Abstract
This article employs a range of sources to critically explore the role of children and young people in county
lines drug dealing, the potential harms they are exposed to and the difficulties of protecting them. As county
lines centre upon the movement and exploitation of vulnerable peoples, we utilise the human trafficking
literature for further insights into the dynamics of county lines and current policy responses. The article
concludes by discussing the challenges of safeguarding young people, particularly that over-worked and
under-resourced frontline practitioners can experience difficulties identifying the vulnerability of young
people caught up in county lines, particularly beneath their tough exteriors.
Keywords
adverse childhood experiences, county lines, drug dealing, gangs, human trafficking, safeguarding, vulnerable
young people
Introduction
In January 2017, Councillor Joe Calouri of Islington wrote a letter warning the Home
Secretary that the exploitation of children and young people as drug couriers and dealers
in county lines drug dealing could be the next ‘grooming scandal’ (Islington Gazette,
2017). He later emphasised the need to urgently ‘work together on this to safeguard vul-
nerable young people’ (cited in Wright, 2017).
County lines drug dealing is a new, and rapidly evolving, drug supply model which
sees urban drug dealers cross police borders to exploit provincial drug markets. County
lines activity is defined as out-of-town dealers (OTD) ‘from a large urban area travelling
to smaller locations (such as a county or coastal town) to sell class A drugs, specifically
crack cocaine and heroin’ (National Crime Agency (NCA), 2017: 5). The rise of county
Corresponding author:
James Windle, Discipline of Criminology, University College Cork, Cork, T12 K8AF, Ireland.
Email: james.windle@ucc.ie
Windle et al.
65
lines activity represents a new departure for British drug markets. Historically, the United
Kingdom’s major cities have served as national supply ‘hubs’ which provide bulk amounts
to mid-level distributors in smaller cities and towns some distance from themselves (NCA,
2016; Pearson and Hobbs, 2001). Drugs would be transported from these regional hubs to
be sold by local wholesalers and filtered into the local retail market through transactions
undertaken by local lower-level retail sellers (Matrix Knowledge Group, 2007) and ‘user-
dealers’, often ‘born and bred’ in the area (May and Hough, 2004). County lines con-
versely involve operators in hub cities travelling to towns and cities within a wide radius
of their home area. Not only do they deliver their product to that location as a ‘weight’ for
wholesale, but they also retail it there using a combination of controlled and controlling
young sellers from the urban hub, as well as vulnerable individuals from the new locality
(Coomber and Moyle, 2012; Robinson et al., 2019; Windle and Briggs, 2015a).
County lines has been widely characterised as a gang problem (e.g. HM Government,
2016; NCA, 2016), and while we recognise the frequent involvement of gangs in county
lines activity, in this article, we have substituted gangs (used in the original NCA defini-
tion) with the term ‘out-of-town dealers’ (OTD) as our own work (Windle and Briggs,
2015b), and informal discussions with practitioners suggest varying levels of coordina-
tion by gangs, and that some OTD may be unconnected to gangs.1 This said, in the three
provincial drug market spaces visited by Coomber and Moyle (2018), OTD were described
as being part of larger groups or organisations, often referred to as ‘gangs’, ‘firms’ or
‘crews’. While there were observations of supply hierarchies, these dealers were identi-
fied by respondents as loosely structured entrepreneurial groups of similarly ranking
friends, family or acquaintances.
While OTD inhabit the higher levels of the county lines structure, they largely
remain anonymous, organising supply from the safety of the urban locale, or at a mid-
level, visiting the provincial market to drop-off stock but staying within the relative
safety of the local dealing base (Coomber and Moyle, 2018). Below these OTD, how-
ever, are labourers or subcontractors who undertake the vast majority of risky street-
level supply activity. In the context of county lines this includes ‘couriers’ (individuals
trafficking drugs out of the urban area to the new location), ‘runners’ (individuals
delivering purchased drugs to the consumer), ‘sitters’ (individuals managing drug
dealing houses for the enterprise) (Coomber and Moyle, 2018) and ‘cuckooed resi-
dents’ (individual housing dealers who sell drugs from their residence) (Coomber and
Moyle, 2012; Spicer et al., 2019).
Since 2016, the NCA (2016, 2017, 2018) have surveyed police forces in England and
Wales on the prevalence of county lines in their areas. In 2016, 83 per cent of forces
reported county lines activity (71 per cent forces reported established county line activity
and 12 per cent reported an emerging issue), rising to 88 per cent in 2017 and 100 per cent
in 2018. While the scope and spread of this phenomenon is alarming in itself, it is the
systematic use of predatory recruitment and exploitation which render it distinct and have
led to appeals for an urgent national response built around safeguarding vulnerable popu-
lations (HM Government, 2016; NCA, 2015, 2016).
The exact reason for the formation of county lines is unclear. It has been suggested that
some OTD left urban areas due to the saturation of local drug markets (Windle and Briggs,
66
Youth Justice 20(1-2)
2015b; Robinson et al., 2019; Spicer, 2019). Many urban drug markets have, however,
previously experienced periods of saturation that did not cause a push to explore new
markets. It is, thus, likely that a number of factors converged at a particular time, notably
the rehousing of gang members outside of London (Windle and Briggs, 2015b): the model
may then have been imitated and spread once its usefulness was recognised (Spicer et al.,
2019). The choice of location can be informed by gang members having family or inti-
mate relationships in the new locations (HM Government, 2015), through partnerships
developed in prison (Windle and Briggs, 2015b) or intelligence gathered in prison on the
laxity of law enforcement or range of opportunities in target areas (Royal United Service
Institute (RUSI), 2016). These factors echo Allum’s (2016) research on Italian mafia
migration and move beyond the stale ‘balloon effect’ argument (Windle and Farrell, 2012)
to suggest that illicit entrepreneurs and markets adapt mainly through a combination of
push and pull factors.
There is less clarity around when the exploitation of young people, and vulnerable
adults, became an integral element of the county lines model. There is a long history of
young people being used in some open drug markets before the emergence of county
lines, most often as runners (Lupton et al., 2002), although this was a rarity in most local
markets. We would suggest that there has been a step-change from such sporadic exploita-
tion, likely from within family and friendship networks, to more widespread and sys-
tematic exploitation employing techniques of coercive control discussed below. Our
understanding of county lines would, however, be much developed by an in-depth and
contextualised tracing of this historical process.
County lines are an emerging phenomena and consequently have only recently begun
to receive research attention. The relatively small number of academic studies represent a
useful starting point, but have all been limited by relatively small participant numbers.
Published reports by state bodies, notably the annual NCA intelligence reports, are an
important data source. Government publications are, however, limited by partiality
(Windle and Silke, 2019), and there are significant gaps between police intelligence and
drug market realities (Coomber, 2006; Dorn et al., 1990; Windle and Briggs, 2015b). The
limitations of numerical police data are well documented. They can be influenced by
numerous economic, political and institutional factors, including resource availability,
public reporting (Maguire, 2007), the ‘zealousness with which law enforcement agencies
pursue drug offenders’ (Ousey and Lee, 2002: 81) and changes to reporting categories. All
of which can be influenced by political or media pressure (Windle, 2018).
While acknowledging these limitations, this article draws from a review of the aca-
demic, governmental and non-governmental literature, and police data focused on ‘chil-
dren involved in county lines’ obtained from the South East Regional Crime Unit (SECRU)
(period 1 January 2018 to 31 July 2018) covering Surrey, Sussex, Hampshire and Thames
Valley force areas. This literature is supported by our own previously published empirical
research (Coomber et al., 2014; Coomber and Moyle, 2012, 2018; Coomber and Pyle,
2015; Moyle, 2019; Windle and Briggs, 2015a, 2015b) and...
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