THE drugs found on a Cardigan man would have had a street value of around £1,000 a jury was told.

Swansea Crown Court was given evidence by a detective constable for Dyfed-Powys Police who specialises in drugs on the first day of the trial of Daniel Liam Meyler.

Meyler, 42, of Williams Terrace, Cardigan, is accused of possession of a class A drug with intent to supply. He denies the charge but has admitted a charge of possession of a class A drug and a charge of possession of a class B drug with intent to supply.

Miss Jones, prosecuting, told the court that the 11.7g of diamorphine – or heroin as it is more commonly known – had a purity level of 26 per cent and that it had been diluted with caffeine and paracetamol. She told the court in her opening remarks that the drugs had been secreted by Meyler in a police van at Ammanford Police Station and the main package contained five smaller packages.

She told the court the smaller packages had between 1.66g and 3.7g in them, with the total being 11.7g.

DC Paul Kelly, of Dyfed-Powys Police, told the court that the purity level was on the lower end of the scale, and that it would have had a wholesale value of between £400 and £750 and would have a street value of between £800 to £1,200.

He told the court that a number of messages between the defendant and others used terms associated with drug dealing and referenced ‘b’ meaning ‘brown’ which is usually a term for heroin, and that ‘citric’ is what is used to burn the heroin before use.

Ashanti-Jade Walton, defending, queried whether ‘b’ could also mean ‘bud’ in talk about cannabis and asked if DC Kelly knew of Meyler’s admittance of that charge, which he denied knowing about, but agreed it could be about cannabis.

She also explained how addictive heroin was and how most users would need a lot of fixes, bringing up the covid pandemic and the link between drug users buying in larger amounts because of the restrictions on travel in place, which DC Kelly said he had seen happen.

“So would you agree that someone purchasing a large amount of drugs doesn’t mean make them a drug dealer does it?,” asked Miss Walton, to which DC Kelly replied “no.”

Miss Walton also questioned DC Kelly on the prices of drugs in various places, asking whether it would be cheaper to buy heroin from a city such as Newport rather than in a smaller place like Cardigan, which he agreed with.

The court also heard from Carmel Campbell, a civilian field intelligence officer at Dyfed-Powys Police who specialises in automatic number plate recognition (ANPR). She told the court how ANPR works, explaining that you input the relevant registration and dates and select which cameras you are asked to, which is what she did on request of a police officer at the force, when tracking the silver Renault Laguna between Cardigan and Newport, Gwent, where the prosecution alleges he bought the drugs that were found on him when pulled over by police in Cross Hands on October 16, 2021.

Ms Campbell confirmed that the data is deleted after 12 months, unless it is requested to be kept by police officers.

The trial resumes on Thursday, March 30.