'Fright of their lives': Moment drug dealers accidentally open front door to armed police

Watch: Dealers surprised by armed police

Police footage shows the moment two surprised drug dealers leave a flat only to be greeted with armed police poised to raid them.

Officers were getting ready to force their way into the flat when they saw the door open.

The clip shows Wesley Carter and Keelan Simpson get greeted with firearms and torches as they are ordered out and arrested.

Inside, police found three revolvers, a black handgun, half a kilo of cocaine worth £19,000 and a 50-plant cannabis farm.

West Midlands Police said the pair were given the "fright of their lives" by the armed unit's arrival and taking the weapons off the streets had potentially saved lives.

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Detective Sergeant Dan Tang, from the West Midlands Regional Organised Crime Unit (ROCU), said: "They certainly got a shock when they opened the flat door.

"Maybe they’d heard footsteps and had expected to find a customer... they couldn’t have been more wrong."

The force received intelligence that Carter and Simpson had access to firearms and launched the raid on the flat in Bartley Green, south-west Birmingham.

Officers also found ammunition-making equipment and just under 80 rounds, along with a leaflet with instructions for making bullets – though there is no evidence either men made their own.

Carter, 39, of Quinton, Birmingham, admitted possession of illegal guns and ammunition, Class A drugs and cannabis cultivation and was given nine years and six months in prison at Birmingham Crown Court on 22 February.

Simpson, 24, also of Quinton, admitted firearms offences and cannabis cultivation and was given seven years and six months behind bars.

"The revolvers were examined by ballistics experts and identified as being manufactured in the late 1800s. However, they were all fully functioning, lethal weapons," DS Tang said.

"The 9mm handgun was capable of firing in both semi-automatic and fully automatic modes and had three unfired bulleted cartridges in the magazine.

"Some deadly weapons and we’ve potentially saved lives by taking them off the streets."

Experts did not link the weapons to any West Midlands shootings.

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