Luke Ryan was caught trying to smuggle cocaine and cannabis to inmates at Winchester jail, a court has heard. Police were lying in wait for Luke Ryan, pictured, at the prison after suspicions were raised about his conduct. They found cocaine, cannabis and cannabis resin in the 34-year-old’s black Reebok bag. Heroin and more than £3,000 in cash was found at his Southampton home, it was claimed Winchester Crown Court heard that Ryan told police he was taking the items into the jail because he was being blackmailed. He said inmates had threatened to tell the prison governor about his second job as a doorman of a nightclub, something he was suspended for in April 2007. In a second interview with police in March, Ryan produced two letters – dated in December 2007, before his arrest – in which he claims he wrote to the prison, highlighting the situation he was in. In them the ex-Surrey police officer admitted bringing CDs and pornographic material into the jail and said he had been “subject to a campaign of threats, intimidation and bullying”. Stephen Parish, prosecuting, said: “Make no bones about this, these letters were forged in the sense the defendant wrote them after the event in an attempt to pervert the course of justice and to pretend he’d brought things to the attention of the prison. “This qualifies for The Man Booker Prize for fiction.” Mr Parish, referring to messages on a Nokia mobile phone found at Ryan’s flat, added: “They show first of all that this defendant was far more involved than he said and secondly that he was not acting under any duress.” Ryan, of Hill Lane, denies a conspiracy to supply cocaine and a lesser charge of possession of the drug, with intent to supply. He also pleaded not guilty to a conspiracy to supply cannabis and cannabis resin and a further charge of possessing heroin with intent to supply
Comments