IT’S long held the infamous title of ‘Europe’s drugs capital’, with alleyways, car parks and bin stores taken over by hollow-eyed junkies.
Now, despairing Glasgow residents say super-pure cocaine is sparking a fresh wave of misery, sending addicts into the grip of psychosis as they shoot up with filthy needles discarded on street corners.
Glasgow is in the grip of a cocaine crisis, fuelling violent gang warfare that left one shopkeeper missing a leg[/caption]
Bags of coke and used syringes litter the streets, evidence of the scale of the problem[/caption]
Drug lords have been caught smuggling cocaine worth £100m from South America in banana shipments[/caption]
The crisis in Scotland‘s second city is so severe it recently became home to the UK’s first ever drug consumption room, where addicts can inject smack and cocaine in private booths, without fear of arrest.
But gangland feuds continue to spill on to the streets, with one shocking machete attack even costing a victim his leg.
A shocking 833 suspected drug deaths were recorded in Glasgow in the first nine months of 2024, according to the latest figures.
And in 2023 there were 303 suspected drug deaths in Greater Glasgow – a rise of 41 per cent on the year before.
In the latest part of The Sun’s series, Hooked, we visited the embattled city, which has been under the thumb of notorious kingpins like the ‘The Iceman’ Jamie Stevenson, who ran a £100million drugs empire until his downfall late last year.
Scott Richards, a former addict-turned-recovery activist who works with young users, knows all too well the damage that crack cocaine can do.
“I’d say I got 15 years of use before I was aware that my mental health was taking a beating,” he tells us.
“But the purity of cocaine in Glasgow means the younger generation are not getting that – they’re getting affected instantly.
“So within the first couple of years, what we’re seeing in the meetings is that the psychosis is upon them, the suicidal thoughts are on them, and they’re really struggling with their mental health.”
Earlier this year, The Sun was able to visit the controversial consumption room in the city’s East End, called the Thistle, before it officially opened in January.
It is hoped that the sterile and safe environment will reduce deaths.
We found vein-detecting equipment and baskets full of ready-to-go needles, and even a large lounge space and free laundry.
In its first week alone, the “fix room” welcomed nearly 20 users a day.
And the latest figures showed that over eight in ten users were there to use cocaine, according to the city council.
It follows worrying reports that the potency of the Class A drug has soared over the last decade, with an analysis of waste water conducted shortly before the Covid-19 pandemic suggesting purity had reached a record high.
Despite the efforts of the consumption centre, former drug users warn it may be doomed to fail.
Addicts are so desperate, and so unconcerned about the consequences, they won’t bother to make even a short walk to the facility.
One serial relapser told us that if he has drugs on his person, he will take them there and then – even if that means shooting up in a lane or car park that’s much more dangerous.
The Morrisons car park next door is also littered with needles and drug paraphernalia – despite being just yards from a safe alternative.
Former user Scott Richards has been sober for five years[/caption]
Booths in the consumption centre, where users can inject drugs without fear of arrest[/caption]
A bag used to store coke found in a car park nearby the consumption centre[/caption]
Gang clashes
And the battle against drug gangs in Glasgow is becoming harder and harder.
The issue is particularly serious in the city’s poverty-stricken estates, where vulnerable addicts can be found slumped over against a backdrop of concrete tower blocks and grey clouded skies.
Behind the scenes, the city’s addiction is fuelling brutal violence between gangs clashing for control of the lucrative drug trade.
In August 2023, shopkeeper Mohammed Arif lost his leg after he was set upon with a machete because he “wanted to distance” himself from a crime group.
One of the assailants, William Dickson, received a sentence of nine years in jail followed by five years on licence.
We had men knock on our doors asking us for sex throughout the night
Kayleigh McGrath
In August, six mobsters were convicted for a scheme to flood Glasgow with £100million worth of cocaine, smuggled in bananas.
Jamie Stevenson, 59, David Bilsland, 68, and Paul Bowes, 53, pleaded guilty to serious organised crime and drug offences following a trial at the High Court in Glasgow.
Stevenson, the ringleader who was also known as the ‘Iceman’, was sentenced to two decades behind bars.
And in October last year, officers recovered £5.5million worth of drugs from a safehouse on a north Glasgow estate.
Included in the haul was more than 90kg of cocaine, 23kg of heroin, and a firearm.
In August, six mobsters were caught trying to smuggle cocaine to Glasgow via bananas[/caption]
The group’s ringleader, Jamie “Iceman” Stevenson, was sentenced to 20 years in prison[/caption]
A shop worker lost his leg after being attacked by a gang in the Pollok area[/caption]
Meanwhile, hotels housing rough sleeping have racked up thousands of police callouts due to sudden deaths, violence and drug abuse.
Some were so dangerous that the homeless actually opted to stay out on the streets.
A visitor to one of these halfway houses told how she was left “terrified” by a stay.
“We had men knock on our doors asking us for sex throughout the night,” said Kayleigh McGrath, who visited in October 2022.
“We saw yet another clearly on drugs bashing the door with a fire extinguisher. We asked the front desk to call police and an ambulance.
“We were terrified.”
Infection gamble
Injecting cocaine causes the drug to be absorbed into the body extremely quickly, providing an intense and immediate high.
But it led to the city finding itself at the centre of Britain’s worst HIV outbreak among drug users in 30 years, at the start of the decade.
Recovering addict Francis Wilson, 50, still vividly remembers what it was like to try the drug for the first time.
“I took my first injection of cocaine at 39 years of age,” he tells us. “I’d never messed with needles or anything, but at that point in my life I’d lost my children, I’d lost everything, I was a broken man.
“I was sitting with all these boys and I’m still on heroin, and I see this boy who’s just looking a bit down, then I see him shoot this coke into himself.
My selfish mind took me to pick up that tool and put it into my arm
Francis Wilson
“I’d never heard of people jagging it, only people smoking it and snorting it. So my selfish mind took me to pick up that tool and put it into my arm.
“And I went from a heroin user to a cocaine user quite fast. That was the trend. I know addicts from my past that were always doing heroin and now they’re all running about chasing coke. And it’s not coke to snort or smoke, it’s coke to inject.
“So it is a big epidemic and it’s a big crisis in Glasgow. It certainly took this man to his knees.”
The high rates of drug addiction encouraged an outbreak of HIV at the start of the decade[/caption]
Much of the crisis is concentrated in the poor estates surrounding the city centre, some of the most deprived areas in the country[/caption]
While heroin users usually only need to shoot up a couple of times a day, crack cocaine addicts will inject much more frequently – as much as every couple of hours.
This massively increases the chances for diseases like HIV to transmit.
Dr Andrew McAuley of Glasgow Caledonian University said injecting cocaine is “one of the strongest drivers” of the huge rise in cases, creating what they called a “perfect HIV storm”.
Drug rooms
It was within the last decade that the crisis reached such a scale that desperate city officials began to consider the safe consumption room as an option.
The facility was first proposed for Glasgow in 2016, but years of debate between the Scottish and UK governments ensued.
It was finally approved in the autumn of 2023, with running costs expected to reach nearly £7million over the next three years.
But Francis reckons the already common sight of discarded needles and drug paraphernalia in the city centre will soar and the facility will do little to help.
Francis Wilson was once an addict but now helps others get sober[/caption]
Baskets of fresh needles helps users avoid transmitting diseases at the cosumption centre[/caption]
Vein-detecting equipment lets users consume drugs in relative safety[/caption]
“Where are you going when the consumption room shuts? Are you going to open it 24 hours, seven days a week?” he said.
Currently, the centre is open from 9am to 9pm and manned by trained staff.
“If you’re closing the doors at a certain time then the problem’s never going to go away,” he added.
“As an addict myself, in recovery, when I was on the streets, if somebody said to me to go to the consumption room, I’d have said no.
“If you’ve got your drugs, you’re taking them. If you’re an addict in Glasgow city centre, you’re not walking half an hour to take them.”
“They’re getting taken right there and then, and these people need to understand that. It just scares me to think how far they will go with this safe consumption room? There’s a lot of fear around it.”
Get Help:
If you think that you have a drug addiction then please contact your GP.
You can also visit FRANK for honest information about drugs and to find local treatment services.
If you are having trouble finding the right help, call the FRANK drugs helpline on 03001236600
Or click here to visit the NHS website for more advice and support.
Experts, however, believe it will be years until the full impact of the pilot scheme will be understood.
The dad-of-five, from Pollok, who is five years sober, runs The Streets social media channels which raise awareness of issues facing addicts.
Francis started taking drugs as a teenager after being bullied and his habit spiralled out of control when he left a children’s home and took to the streets.
He recalls shooting up in alleys and tragically watching friends die in front of his eyes as addiction claimed countless lives.
Francis, who also has four grandkids, added: “Rehab and emphasising the message is key. I truly believe the power of talk when it’s coming from the heart and coming from good places, then if there’s action put into that we can really save lives.”
This view was also echoed by Scott.
The dad-of-two, 42, has been sober for five years and now runs the East End Walk and Talk group, where he and other addicts and those in recovery go on walks and runs to clear their heads.
Now a taxi driver, Scott knows firsthand how bad the cocaine problem in the city is.
And just like Francis, he doesn’t think the drug consumption room is the answer.
“It’s as clear as the nose on your face that a route to abstinence, total abstinence, is the only way we can do this. I get it on paper, the consumption room is a safe space for people,” he says.
“But I believe that the millions of pounds spent on it could have gone into beds for an abstinence programme. I firmly believe that the SNP have missed the boat on this one.
“The people making the decisions have no lived experience, the reality is not there for them.
“They’re making the decisions and ticking the boxes, but for the people on the street who have gone through it and recovered and are still recovering, abstinence is the only way for us.”
The Sun has contacted Glasgow City Council for comment.
