A Kent council have secured a closure order on a suspected county lines flat following a police raid that saw three teenagers arrested.

Mobile phones, cash and 10 wraps of heroin were seized during the raid on the flat in Park Place, Ashford last Friday.

A19-year-old and 16-year-old, both from Dagenham in east London, and a 18-year-old, from Kilburn in west London, were arrested at the scene.
They have been bailed until May 7, and today Ashford Borough Council carried out a court order on the property.

The order means that nobody except no-one, apart from the tenants, council staff, healthcare professionals, and police officers, are allowed to enter the flat for the next three months.

Anyone who is found in the property without authorisation can face a fine, or a jail time of up to 51 weeks.

A council spokesman said: "Magistrates were told that the defendant appeared to have no control over who was visiting the address or their disruptive and anti-social behaviour.

"This is not the first instance of county lines activity being conducted there, and also not the first time that the defendant’s property has been subject to a closure order."

Kent Police have previously warned that county lines dealers often find apartments and flats owned by vulnerable people and 'cuckoo' them.

This means that they take over the house or apartment and use it as a base from which to run their drugs operations.

It is not known whether or not an incident of 'cuckooing' has happened in Park Place.

Cllr Bill Barrett, portfolio holder for housing at Ashford Borough Council, said: “This underlines that we have a zero tolerance approach towards this sort of behaviour.

"This property has been the root of persistent problems and nuisance to residents with people visiting at all hours, drug dealing, and causing noise and intimidation.

“These issues make people’s lives a misery and we hope the work undertaken to gather a case for this orders will reassure our communities that we do not tolerate it and we will respond with appropriate action."

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