Drug dealer jailed for heroin mixed with animal sedative

A Swansea drug dealer has been jailed for three years after being caught selling heroin adulterated with a powerful veterinary sedative. 💊⚖️

Jake Tipping, 30, of Cromwell Street, Mount Pleasant, was arrested after police approached a woman conducting a street drug deal who revealed two men had moved into her home and coerced her into selling drugs.

Officers raided the property on Grandison Street in Haod, where they found Tipping with wraps of heroin mixed with medetomidine – a powerful animal sedative – along with £525 in cash and a mobile phone that was “constantly ringing”.

The phone contained messages about supplying heroin and cocaine, recruiting “workers”, and extensive contact with a known Swansea drugs line. A subsequent search of Tipping’s home uncovered cocaine.

Tipping, who has five previous convictions including two robberies and firearms possession, was on licence from a 2021 five-year prison sentence when he committed these offences. He won’t be released until December 2026.

In an emotional letter read to Swansea Crown Court, Tipping said: “I am deeply remorseful that I have allowed my demons to create demons for others by dealing drugs.” He explained that childhood experiences had caused “demons” leading to drug misuse and “trying to prove I am a man”.

The defendant told the court he had moved to Swansea to be closer to his children in Pembrokeshire and “to improve himself and to prove himself” to his former partner, but had fallen in with the “wrong crowd”.

Defence barrister James McKenna said Tipping’s new partner was “a good influence” and asked the court to find his remorse genuine.

Judge Geraint Walters sentenced Tipping to three years imprisonment, which will run concurrently with his recall period. No action was taken against the woman who led police to him.