Shane Kelly (Image: South Wales Police)
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A 36-year-old from Skewen has been sentenced to 32 months in prison after detectives connected him to a mobile phone seized during a drugs raid – a device that had been passed between dealers and contained a contacts book of users.
The drugs phone
Swansea Crown Court heard that officers searching a property in Briton Ferry in July 2024 – as part of a separate investigation – recovered a mobile phone from the address. Analysis of the device revealed it had been used by three different people, each operating their own SIM card.
One of those SIM cards was traced back to Shane Kelly, of High Street, Skewen, Neath. Prosecutor Ryan Bowen told the court the phone had been bought and sold between dealers, and came complete with a stored list of drug users as contacts.
Arrest and evidence
Detectives spent months trying to track Kelly down before eventually locating and arresting him in July 2025 at the St Ives pub in Neath town centre. A search at the time found him carrying a small quantity of cannabis.
When interviewed, Kelly gave “no comment” responses to all questions put to him, with the sole exception of claiming he had been involved in a dispute over camping equipment with a man called Callum.
A subsequent search of the defendant’s home turned up weighing scales bearing traces of white powder alongside a quantity of snap-seal bags.
Supply network
The court was told that Facebook and phone messages recovered by police showed Kelly had been directly supplying cocaine to users. He had also been passing quantities of the Class A drug to a man called Shane Bowen, who was himself operating as a dealer.
Among the messages police retrieved was one written by Kelly which read: “You know it is going to be a good day when people are messaging you this early asking for you know what.”
Shane Bowen was sentenced to three years in prison in December 2024 for being concerned in the supply of cocaine.
Previous offending
Kelly had 13 previous convictions spanning 20 offences. His criminal record included possession of cocaine, production of cannabis, possession of cannabis with intent to supply, and drug-driving.
Defence mitigation
Emily Bennett, representing Kelly, described her client as a self-employed plasterer living in stable accommodation with a partner, a very young child, and another baby on the way. She said he was “extremely remorseful” for the “potentially difficult position” he had put those who depend on him in.
The barrister told the court that Kelly had made significant changes since his arrest and was now abstinent from cocaine, though he remained a regular cannabis user and recognised he needed to address that as well.
Sentencing
Judge Huw Rees told the defendant that evidence in the case demonstrated “others operated in the supply chain through you” and that there had been “elements of intimidation in enforcing drug debts.”
The judge noted Kelly’s previous convictions “show a predilection for an involvement with drugs” along with a “wholesale failure to comply with court orders,” and concluded that only an immediate custodial sentence was appropriate.
After receiving a one-third reduction for his guilty pleas to being concerned in the supply of cocaine and simple possession of cannabis, Kelly was sentenced to 32 months in prison. He will serve up to half that term in custody before being released on licence to complete the remainder in the community.
