An uncle and two of his nephews have been locked up for street drug dealing in the Manningham area of Bradford.

The three were netted by Operation Stalebank, a purge on gangs offering a speedy service delivering wraps of heroin and crack cocaine to addicts in the city. Undercover police officers posed as drug users to phone dealers and lure them to specific locations, mainly in the West Bowling and Manningham areas. The dealers were secretly filmed selling their wares and later arrested.

Yesterday Shah Anwar, 43, of Devonshire Terrace, Manningham, was jailed for five years after a jury last month found him guilty of eight offences involving the selling Class A drugs.

Anwar, who worked on the ‘Junior 2 Line’, was labelled a professional drug dealer by the Recorder of Bradford, Judge Roger Thomas QC.

He sold drugs four times from a Saab car in June last year. Anwar’s barrister, Yunus Valli, said his client was a married man who worked as a mechanic.

With Anwar in the dock were his nephews Safraz Rabnawaz, 28, and Shazad Nawaz, 19, both of addresses in Oak Lane, Manningham.

Rabnawaz was imprisoned for 40 months and Nawaz was sent to a young offender institution for 30 months.

Both pleaded guilty at earlier hearings to 13 charges of supplying Class A drugs, also working for the ‘Junior 2 Line.’ Oliver Jarvis, for Nawaz, said he had a problem with use of skunk cannabis but was now off drugs and about to complete a college course.

Robin Frieze, barrister for Rabnawaz, said he had been drawn into criminality to fund his drugs habit and pay off a debt.