Englishman who spent ten years on the run

Englishman who spent ten years on the run after failing to appear at a Glasgow court on serious drugs charges has been tracked down to Manchester.

Andrew Spooner, 41, from Leicester, was one of ten men on a ‘most wanted’ list who were thought to be hiding out in Spain.

Spooner, from Leicester, was arrested by officers from the Serious Organized Crime Agency at around 6.30pm on Thursday in Salford, Greater Manchester. He had failed to appear at the High Court in Glasgow in 2001, a year after he was arrested in Edinburgh.

Spooner is the third man to be rounded up in the past month as part of a large-scale police investigation dubbed Operation Captura.

Since being launched in October 2006 in the Costa del Sol region of Spain, the inquiry has snared 41 out of the 60 names on its list.

Dave Cording, Director of Operations at Crimestoppers, said: "This is an incredible achievement and I would like to thank the public for contacting us with information. I would like to take this opportunity to appeal to public to take a look at the remaining 19 wanted individuals and call us and tell us what you know, not who you are.

"I would also like to send out a message to the remaining wanted individuals that you can run but you can’t hide forever because someone, somewhere, will recognise you.

"If you have any information on the remaining appeals remember you can contact Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111 or through our website crimestoppers-uk.org"

Two Scots still on the run are 31-year-old William Paterson, who is wanted in connection with the murder of Glasgow gangland figure Kevin ‘Gerbil’ Carroll, and 47-year-old Derek McGraw Ferguson, who is wanted over the murder of Thomas Cameron at the Auchinairn Tavern in Auchinairn on June 28, 2007.

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