Imprisoned UFF Drug lord Glenn Rainey boasted in messages to his clients that “the east is the best place for coke dealers.”
the admission shows just how mired the terror group is in the drug trade, particularly in east Belfast, where police have seized more than £1m worth of cocaine and cannabis linked to the UVF in the past year.
Rainey (36) was locked up for three years last Thursday after being convicted of commercial drug supply alongside his older brother Mark Rainey (42). A third co-accused, William “Buff” Hunter, a UDA sympathizer, was jailed for 20 months.
The trio were arrested last year in what police said was an operation targeting the East Belfast UVF.
By then the Rainey brothers had close ties to the organization and were considered its biggest drug dealers on Newtownards Road.
This is reflected in the way Glenn brags to his customers about how cocaine dealers are met in east Belfast.
He also told them, while promoting powerful cocaine at £2,000 an ounce: “I was a crook from school.”
Detectives estimated the gang were making at least £10,000 a week selling drugs to a large customer base.
They say some of the money was returned to the East Belfast UVF for protection, but this has been denied by sources within the group, who insist the Raineys were suspended following their arrest in a separate cocaine supply case in 2019.
An example of how much money the brothers were making can be found in a text message exchange between them in which Mark accuses his younger brother of “blowing £30,000”.
A previous hearing examined how Glenn Rainey used his drug money to “travel the world”, including regular trips to Thailand.
He fled there for three months in January 2019 after the killing of East Belfast UVF loyalist Ian Ogle. A cocaine dealer has been charged with murder on his return to Northern Ireland – a charge he strongly denies.
Loyal insiders say Rainey’s rise through the ranks of the UVF was due to his ability to make money from the drug trade rather than any strong political beliefs. They point to how the gang hit him with a knee cap twice for anti-social behavior when he was 19 and then 26.
“Glen Rainey was seen as a hoodlum, a man who had little interest in loyalism,” a UVF source told Sunday Life.
“But he was promoted and protected because he made a lot of money from drug dealing. This was after he was hit twice on the kneecap for anti-social behaviour.
“It displeased the good Loyalists to see a hood like him swaggering untouchable down Newtownards Road, and flying off to rest until they had a pot to play in.”
Sentencing Glenn Rainey at Antrim Crown Court last Thursday, the judge described him as a “significant player” in the illegal drug trade and that he could rightly be described as a “leading role”.
Buff Hunter, who has two convictions for drug dealing, has been described as a “career criminal” whose latest crimes are “just the latest in a long series of crimes that shows no signs of ending”.
The judge added: “They know each other, there are links between them… there are other individuals involved in this network and it is clear from the reports that they are not operating in isolation.”
Welcoming the gang’s sentences, PSNI Detective Sergeant Thompson said: “Along with our partners, we remain determined to stop the criminal activities of those gangs who make a living from crime.
“They don’t care about the lives and relationships that are affected, destroyed or lost along the way.”
