DRUG dealer David Jenkins claims UDA ‘C’ Coy bosses tried to lure him back to Shankill last week just days after being told the terror gang planned to murder him.
The 41-year-old refused, telling the Sunday World: “I won’t be the next Alan McCollough.”
Jenkins, a cocaine kingpin who claims to have made the gang millions in drug cash over the last year-and-a-half, was not only a peddler for the UDA – but he is also understood to have been a member himself.
He was close to both current and former loyalists within its ranks, and was, at one time, one of the chief organisers of the Shankill’s Eleventh Night bonfire.
But as the saying goes, there is no honour among thieves.
Today the man known as ‘Mr P’ – who operated one of Ulster’s biggest cocaine networks – will have already left Northern Ireland days after being told his former comrades planned to kill him.
Jenkins claims the same men vowed to protect him at all costs after February’s gangland attempt on his life.
“After the shooting I was still under the UDA’s protection,” claimed Jenkins. “They kept saying, we’ll stand by you, we’ll stand by you. Did they f***.
“The people involved in the shooting are still walking about. They know the driver, they know the gunman. I was reassured that they were going to be done. “They’ll probably bring them in to deal for them next, they don’t give two f**** about the shooting.
“Their words are f* all. All they care about is money.”
Despite this, the cocaine dealer continued to peddle drugs under the UDA’s control. However, he claims to have “kept money back” from the terror gang after claiming they racked prices to line their own pockets.
He said: “If you go to a shop and you buy a box of apples, and the box of apples is costing £2 and you are happy paying that there.
“But you like them apples and everyone loves them apples and the product you are getting, and the shop keeper knows that, he then ups the price. “You can go nowhere else because you don’t get the same product as them apples, and the shop keeper keeps upping it.
“Then he ups it that much that people go, what the f***? F*** you.
“And that’s what happened with me.
“I held back the profit and then they accused me of going elsewhere and they said, if you do go elsewhere, we’ll put you out of business.
“And they did. They took two of the burner phones off Mr P’s worker. It had about a week’s worth of numbers from customers.
“But I still have the master phones, they didn’t get those.
“All those wee dealers now that’s all flying about, they are putting it on the Shankill. It’s got f all to do with Mr P, the name they are still using. It’s the UDA.”
In the days after fleeing his Hopewell Crescent home last weekend, he received multiple calls and texts asking to meet with Shankill road bosses to “reassure” him he was safe.
Jenkins believes the treacherous gang really want him back to murder him in a double cross similar to that of former UFF military commander Alan McCullough.
In May 2003, the 21 year-old got into a car with now dead UDA brigadier Ihab Shoukri and West Belfast UDA man Mo Courtney.
He was never seen alive again.
His body was discovered six weeks later in a shallow grave on the outskirts of Belfast.
He had been shot in the head, murdered by the UDA in revenge for siding with ousted UFF boss Johnny Adair in the bloody loyalist feud that saw Adair’s ‘C’ Company flee to England.
Although Ihab Shoukri had been charged with McCullough’s murder, the charge was later dropped.
His partner in the killing, Courtney, eventually pleaded guilty to manslaughter during a third murder trial.
McCullough, a foot soldier for ousted terror boss Johnny ‘Mad Dog’ Adair, had fled Ulster with the former UFF leader and his associates.
Before his murder, he was lured back to the Shankill by UDA members who had gave his family assurances he would not be harmed.
Jenkins claims the man convicted over McCullough’s killing, Mo Courtney, is one of the ‘C’ Coy men who protected his Mr P drugs business.
Convicted UFF member ‘Dopey’ Denis Cunningham, now almost 70, was also fully aware of the UDA’s protection, the 41 year-old claimed.
Both have allegedly passed messages on to the drug dealer that he will not be harmed.
“I wouldn’t believe a word that comes out of Mo Courtney’s mouth about reassurances and not being touched,” he said. “History proves itself with people.
“I fear that I could end up like Alan McCullough. I’ve been asked to come back, that I won’t be touched.
“But I made my decision the night I was told at 11.30pm they were coming to get me. I’m not stupid.”
He added: “I know drug dealing is wrong, but that’s the game I was in, along with the UDA.
“Claims they are trying to clean up is a load of bollocks. West Belfast UDA are dealing drugs and now doing so under the name Mr P.
“Senior members of the UDA up to their neck in it.
“I think the UDA are playing the UVF along and treating them like mugs too. Yes, they have put slack drug dealers out because maybe they aren’t at the bottom of the ladder. The UDA re hypocrites and they think that they run the estate with an iron fist, but they are a pack of ballbags.
“The way they are dealing now, it’s a recipe for disaster. They are going to put themselves in jail or put other people in jail.
“I know drug dealing is wrong but in that line of work it is sad that some people are willing to f*** others over.
Jenkins will now flee across the water for his safety.
“I don’t fear death,” he said. “The UDA is 100 per cent very, very capable of carrying out their threats against me. The same way that the other ones carried out their threat. So far, I’ve been smart enough.
“And hopefully I will continue to be smart enough. But there is no chance I’m going to continue living in Belfast, I’ll be looking over my shoulder every single day.
“Not a chance in hell.”
Patricia Devlin 