A notorious Merseyside gangster has been ordered to repay just one pound of the £500,000 fortune he amassed from his criminal deeds.
Paul ‘Woody’ Woodford, a member of the gang that gunned down nine-year-old Olivia Pratt-Korbel in 2022, was sentenced to more than 24 years in prison in December 2021 for firearms offences and other misdemeanours.
At a proceeds of crime hearing at Manchester crown court involving Woodford, his boss Vincent Coggins – a drug kingpin known as The Headmaster – and co-conspirator Michael Earle, Woodford acknowledged he had benefited to the tune of £499,960.50 from his life of crime.
But the court heard that the gangster, represented by Sebastian Winnett, had only £1 available to pay back.
‘The available figure is a nominal sum given his circumstances,’ Judge John Potter said. ‘I come to the view a confiscation order of £1 should be made. There is no time to pay.’
He added that Coggins and Earle would appear for a fully contested proceeds of crime hearing on September 12.
One of Coggins’ most trusted associates, Woodford has convictions dating back 30 years for incidents including scalping a woman with a machete and torturing a man with a hot iron, machetes and knives.
As a member of Coggins’ European operation, he was part of a heavily-armed gang arrested in Amsterdam.
Woodford was also charged with the 2012 murder of Jason Osu, a 31-year-old currency trader who held a pilot’s licence, but slashed his own throat midway through the trial and refused to answer questions when giving evidence.
He was found not guilty of murder after a seven-week trial and five days of deliberations.
Woodford later adopted the EncroChat handle ‘Kingwasp’, which he used to source and distribute heroin and cocaine shipments for Coggins.
The gang headed by Coggins originated in Stockbridge Village, an area of Knowsley in Merseyside, and was involved in the supply of significant amounts of cocaine and heroin across the UK.
The group imported much of its illicit cargo through the Port of Liverpool before it was distributed nationwide.
It is believed the gang’s activities were assisted by port workers who were tasked with watching containers and a corrupt policeman.
The gang, which had a reputation for extreme violence, included Thomas Cashman, a hitman for Coggins who was sentenced to life for Olivia Pratt-Korbel’s murder.
The group’s use of encrypted EncroChat phones proved its downfall when the North West Regional Organised Crime Unit (NWROCU) gained access to their messages after the platform was hacked by European law enforcement in the early months of 2020.
They had planned to exact vengeance for the theft of a £1 million drug haul by a rival gang, but their messages were monitored by detectives and the plan was thwarted.
Detective chief inspector Dave Worthington, from the NWROCU’s operations team, said: ‘These were extremely dangerous men and, had we not come across the serious threats of violence from the Coggins OCG through Operation Venetic, this could have been a very different outcome.
‘It’s clear that the Coggins OCG thought they were untouchable, and their messages untraceable, but with support from the NCA and Merseyside Police, we were able to bring this criminal enterprise to its knees and prove them wrong. This crime group made substantial amounts of money through their ill-gotten gains.
‘The cash they made was moved and transferred via various means to launder it, which subsequently funded their lavish lifestyles.
‘The sentences this crime group received shows that crime doesn’t pay, and that we will stop at nothing to put those intent on flooding our streets with drugs and violence behind bars.’