British kingpin James Harding lived luxury lifestyle of Bugattis and five-star hotels while plotting murder from desert playground
A British drug lord who boasted about threatening rivals’ grandmothers while living a playboy lifestyle in Dubai has been jailed for life after his encrypted messages exposed a £30million cocaine empire.
James Harding, 34, showed no emotion as he was handed a minimum term of 32 years at the Old Bailey this morning for masterminding a vast criminal network that generated £5million in profits in just 10 weeks.
His loyal lieutenant Jayes Kharouti, 39, was also sentenced to life with a minimum of 26 years after the pair were convicted of conspiracy to murder and cocaine trafficking following one of Britain’s largest ever EncroChat investigations.
The court heard how Harding, who posed as a luxury watch salesman, orchestrated the importation of a tonne of cocaine while enjoying five-star hotels and driving Bugatti and Lamborghini supercars in his Dubai playground.
But his empire came crashing down when French police cracked the supposedly secure EncroChat network, giving Scotland Yard detectives access to thousands of incriminating messages between the criminal associates.
‘Full M for Murder’
In chilling exchanges, the drug lords discussed recruiting a hitman to carry out the “full M” – their code for murder – on a rival courier they wanted “permanently out of business.
Prosecutor Duncan Atkinson KC told the court how Harding first suggested a “cryp robbery” – stealing drugs from a courier – before the plan escalated into assassination.
Kharouti offered the potential gunman £100,000 for the hit, with instructions from his boss that it should involve a “double tap” – shots to both head and chest. When transport issues arose, the price was increased to £120,000, though another EncroChat user suggested the going rate should be at least £200,000.
The plot was only foiled when police arrested the alleged hitman on June 3, 2020 – though the kingpins remained oblivious to his capture.
Threats to Grandmothers
Among the most disturbing messages uncovered was Harding’s casual discussion of violence against anyone who might cooperate with police.
“You just have to know where their nan lives,” he wrote in one exchange. “They all love their nans. They know granny is going to get it in the head lol.”
Judge Anthony Leonard KC noted these threats when passing sentence, highlighting how the defendants had discussed using violence to maintain their criminal empire’s code of silence.
Industrial-Scale Operation
The sheer scale of the operation left even seasoned court officials stunned. Judge Leonard said: “It is hard to comprehend that the quantity of cocaine that the EncroChat messages revealed was imported, or was about to be imported, in only a period of approximately two-and-a-half months.”
Court documents revealed the gang imported approximately 1,000 kilograms of cocaine between April and June 2020, with around 50 separate importations during that period. Messages showed them discussing shipments of six or seven kilograms being delivered to clients in a single day.
“The street value of that amount of cocaine is in excess of £30 million and the profit on such quantities would have been very substantial,” the judge added. “Without the benefit of EncroChat your scale of offending would never have been apparent.”
Life of Luxury
While flooding Britain’s streets with cocaine, Harding lived like a Middle Eastern prince in Dubai. Armed with a UAE residence permit listing his profession as “sales executive of luxury watches,” he enjoyed the finest the emirate had to offer.
The Hampshire-born criminal stayed in five-star hotels and was regularly seen behind the wheel of supercars including Bugattis and Lamborghinis – a far cry from his roots as a teenager selling legal highs through online classified ads.
His extravagant lifestyle was funded by what prosecutors described as an operation turning over millions in profit every month during its peak.
The EncroChat Downfall
Harding used the handle “thetopsking” on the encrypted platform, while Kharouti operated under “besttops” and “topsybricks.” They believed their communications were completely secure from law enforcement.
But when French and Dutch police penetrated EncroChat in 2020, it gave British detectives unprecedented access to real-time criminal conspiracies. Officers spent hundreds of hours analyzing more than 9,000 messages between the pair.
The messages revealed not just drug importation plans but detailed discussions about managing finances, coordinating deliveries across the country, and dealing with security threats. One message from April 2020 showed “thetopsking” providing coordinates near Dover where cocaine shipments arrived by lorry.
International Manhunt
When police raided Kharouti’s Epsom home in 2020, they found a phone with the same number he’d given Harding. But the dealer had already fled, sparking an international manhunt.
He was eventually tracked down in Turkey and extradited back to Britain on June 25 last year. Harding’s arrest came earlier, on December 27, 2021, when Swiss authorities detained him at Geneva Airport. He was extradited to the UK in May 2022.
Criminal Evolution
The court heard Harding had only been free from prison for four years when he decided to “trade up” from Class B to Class A drugs for greater profits. His previous conviction in 2013 for drug offenses and possessing fake ID documents had seen him serve three years behind bars.
Kharouti also brought a criminal pedigree to the partnership, with previous convictions for supplying cocaine and cannabis.
During his trial, Harding bizarrely claimed the “thetopsking” handle belonged to an “intimate” male partner called TK, whom he refused to identify. The jury rejected his defense after a seven-week trial held under extraordinary security, with armed police escorting the defendants to and from court.
Gang Members Fall
Three other gang members had already admitted their roles before the main trial. Calvin Crump, 29, of Redhill, Surrey; Khuram Ahmed, 38, of Slough; and Peter Thompson, 61, of south-west London, all pleaded guilty to the cocaine conspiracy. Thompson also admitted possessing a pistol.
The man alleged to have been recruited as the hitman was acquitted.
Justice Served
Detective Inspector Driss Hayoukane, who led the Met’s EncroChat operation, said: “Thanks to the tenacity and commitment from Met officers, over 500 criminals have been successfully convicted since the EncroChat platform was cracked back in 2020, leading to well over 5,000 years of sentences being handed down.
He added: “Harding and Kharouti planned to kill, we stopped that and put them before the courts. This represents our commitment to combatting illegal drug supply, as well as the serious violence that comes with it.”
As Harding begins his lengthy sentence – reduced to 28 years and 183 days accounting for time already served – his days of Dubai luxury are a distant memory. The man who once cruised in supercars will spend at least the next three decades behind bars, his empire dismantled by the very messages he thought would never see the light of day.
