Two Barnet men involved in a drug smuggling operation that hid £500,000 worth of cocaine in flat pack furniture have been jailed for at total of 23 years.

Glenn Clark, 49, of Ramsey Close, Colindale and Barry Hearn, 32, of Rannoch Close, Edgware, were part of a gang that arranged for Mexican drug contacts to conceal large amounts of cocaine in hollowed out wooden panels of office furniture.

The 20 pieces of furniture were flown to Heathrow Airport in June last year where police officers uncovered the consignment of 48 packages containing high purity cocaine weighing 12.5 kilos.

Officers from the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) allowed the goods to continue on and followed Hearn as he transferred the £500,000 stash to a lock-up garage in Edgware.

He and three others, including Clark were arrested and charged with drug smuggling offences, and appeared at Isleworth Crown Court yesterday.

Clark was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment and Hearn, who pleaded guilty to the charges, was jailed for eight years.

Bimal Puri, 50, from Isleworth in Middlesex, was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment and Jose Perdomo, 49, from Peckham, south-east London, who also pleaded guilty, was sentenced to 12 years.

Passing sentence, Judge Hezlett Colgan said: "This was a large and valuable quantity of cocaine, and in my view this was a well-planned enterprise in which each of you played a part."

Police are still trying to trace a fifth suspect, James Hanley, 40, from Kings Langley, Hertfordshire, in connection with the case.