At 4.30am specialist officers gathered for a briefing. Their mission was to dismantle an organised crime group (OCG) chargeable for the availability of sophistication A medication.

The OCG being focused have been additionally suspected of kidnap and firearms offences.

It's estimated the gang have been making as much as £20,000 a day dealing heroin and crack cocaine within the West Midlands.

In the briefing, police have been advised there have been 12 suspects being sought and that there shall be 16 simultaneous raids in Birmingham, Solihull and Essex.

As the suspects have been all associates, the raids needed to occur at precisely the identical second to keep away from any of them getting warning that police have been on their means.

That second was 5am.

Eleven minutes after the briefing began, it was over and officers have been heading out of their vans, armed with riot gear.

As the minutes handed, on the police radio, groups reported arriving near their places.

Then, over the radio, got here the command "strike, strike, strike".

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With that, the officers moved shortly. They did not need any suspects to have time to eliminate telephones, medication or proof that can incriminate them.

With shouts of "police" they bashed down the entrance door of a home in east Birmingham. Officers ran around the again to ensure the suspect could not get away.

Within minutes, a person was led out in handcuffs.

Across the morning, 9 arrests have been made. Police have established one suspect is now overseas. A manhunt is underway for the opposite two.

The operation is the results of 4 months of investigation focusing on the kingpins of the OCG. It's the biggest single operation to be carried out by the West Midlands County Lines taskforce.

The specialist officers concerned give attention to so-called county strains dealing, the place organised crime teams exploit youngsters and weak adults by recruiting them to maneuver and provide medication.

The taskforce works with different companies to safeguard youngsters who've been exploited by the criminals who run the networks.

The Chief Constable of West Midlands Police, Craig Guildford, advised Sky News: "We've had 240 cops on this operation and we'll be closing down a number of county lines.

"It'll make a really significant impact on drug supply on the area. Some of these lines have a thousand calls a day. These criminals are making money from this illicit enterprise.

"Usually one of many primary sellers will provide different sub sellers and so they'll get youthful individuals concerned on this.

"Our approach from start to finish is to do the safeguarding with the younger, vulnerable element and to target the person supplying the lines and part of the arrest operation today is to make sure we do that top to bottom because that will completely remove and dismantle the OCG.

"We'll take the medication, we'll take the cash and we intend to take different property to current that earlier than the court docket."