A MAN who began drug dealing at the age of eight has told of how he became trapped and how he managed to escape his life of crime.

Rhys is now a youth mentor with charity Escapeline, travelling around schools to tell his story and help protect young people from falling into danger.

He told his story as Dorset Police launched its seventh phase of Operation Scorpion, alongside other police forces in the south west, which works to combat county lines and drug dealing in the region.

Rhys said he became desensitised to drugs from an early age.

“If you think of my home life, if you can think of any form of abuse, that was probably in my household, there was drugs,” the now 26-year-old said.

“First time I probably come into contact with drugs, I was maybe four years old.”

Bournemouth Echo: Escapeline is supported by Dorset's PCC, David Sidwick.

He first had contact with a drug dealer aged eight, and said the dealer began ‘looking after’ him.

Now, he recognises that he was being groomed to sell drugs and was exploited.

“It started off with here's £10, get yourself some food, put some gas, electricity in your house and stuff like that. And then it was hold this bag, here's a phone, answer the calls.

“Then it was me getting caught with crack cocaine and heroin on me in primary school.”

Rhys began to ‘hang around with a certain group of people’, and became embroiled in burglaries, steeling cars, motorbikes and robbing other street dealers.

He was prosecuted for the first time aged 10 for a burglary and gained an ‘extensive’ criminal record.

Rhys told how dealers are exploited by others, with them receiving very small proportions of the cash they earn through selling drugs.

“I was selling things like cannabis, crack cocaine, lean, which is a codeine and promethean mix,” Rhys said.

“I was selling amphetamines, MDMA pills, anything you could get your hands on and that I knew there was a market for.”

Bournemouth Echo:

He said he dealt drugs to the ‘worst of the worst’ drug users at ‘bandos’ [abandoned houses], but also to professionals, including one of his school teachers.

Rhys managed to get out of his situation aged 18, following a police operation.

“They managed to arrest a lot of people in the area,” he said.

“And when they did, I saw that as my opportunity to get out. I thought minimum 24 hours until they get released or remanded or charged. I thought, that's 24 hours. I can get as far away as possible or think of something.

“I spoke to my youth worker and he moved me out the area.”

He said the operation was a ‘wakeup call’ for him.

“I thought, yeah, I might have a Gucci belt or Louis Vuitton, or I might have 500 pounds sat there and a grand sat there, £2,000 sat there,” Rhys said.

“But my friends have died, my friends are in prison. Is that really worth the money?”

Rhys said money was a big reason why people get involved in drug dealing.

“There's budget cuts everywhere, budget cuts to youth services, there's increase of poverty, increased food banks,” he said.

“If you've got little Timmy that's watching his parents struggle to pay the bills, maybe his little brother doesn't have the latest football boots, doesn't have this.

“I know dodgy Dave around the corner has just offered me 300 pounds a week to go to this location for a week. My brother can get football boots, my mum can pay the bills, we can get food shopping.”

Now, Rhys tells his story to children and young people so they can spot when they may be being groomed or exploited and get help.

He also discusses the impact on his mental health, with him facing diagnoses of type three post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety.

Rhys sent a message to anyone who was thinking of buying drugs.

“If you look at the damage that I'm concerned about is every time you purchase drugs of a class a substance, mainly that has gone through the hands of a county line gang, every time you purchase a class a substance, you are then donating to the business or the charity that is exploiting children,” he said.

“That's what county lines is.

“They're not there to follow laws or regulations.

“They don't care how they get their money, who gets abused, who gets hurt, who gets killed, who goes to jail.

“They just care about how much money you've made and how much money they've taken.”

Escapeline was founded by Lisa, a former social worker, with the charity now visiting primary and secondary schools across Dorset and the south, with the support of Dorset’s Police and Crime Commissioner, David Sidwick.

Lisa said: “I realized what was needed was education because professionals weren't aware of this, young people weren't aware of it, parents weren't aware, and the community as well.

“I left social work and set up a charity escape line and basically put together education programs.”

She said they have been going into more and more primary schools, as children exploited become younger. The youngest child they have supported has been just six years old.

“We're getting a really good response and actually the young people don't come away frightened because that's something we have a challenge with, is when you're trying to educate kind of 9,10- and 11-year-olds, you've got to get that balance.

“We always get such a good kind of questions, they come away really interested, wanted to know more, but not at all scared, which is really positive.”

The PCC is supporting the next phase of Operation Scorpion, which aims to make the south west a hostile place for drugs.

The latest phase will show the ‘ring of steel’ around the region, while also focusing on visible street dealing, asking the public to submit intelligence to help identify and tackle those responsible.

PCC Sidwick supported the ‘brilliant’ Escapeline in helping them into schools and to host a conference in the county.