Two business partners who ran a Bradford caf secretly headed a major Yardie drugs operation, a Court heard.

Self-styled community leaders Richard Brown and Michael Benjamin were well-known figures in the Manningham community, managing the Young Lion Caf in Lumb Lane.

But yesterday a judge heard they were also major players in the city's cocaine and crack trade after they were both caught with massive hauls of the drug.

Prosecuting at Leeds Crown Court, Michael Devlin, told how undercover police from the county's anti-Yardie squad caught Brown - widely known as Bingy - handing over £55,000 worth of cocaine smuggled into Britain by the Jamaican gangs called Yardies in a human 'mule'.

Mr Devlin said officers watched Brown pass the package to a London-based buyer named Andrew Curtis in Leeds City train station before swooping on both men. The drugs were wrapped in a bag used at the Young Lion Caf marked "Delicious Hot Food".

He told how after the mule had flown into Gatwick airport - with 36 pellets of cocaine in her stomach - Brown sent a taxi from Bradford to pick her up.

Benjamin, better known as 'Benji', arranged for her to stay in a city hotel and supplied her with a mobile phone to contact them.

After Brown's arrest, he, Benjamin and a friend called Mary Giscombe concocted a story to minimise his role in the operation.

Mr Devlin said the trio made statements that Brown had stepped in to help a Jamaican woman - a friend of Giscombe's - who had been threatened by Yardie gangs to smuggle the drugs. They claimed Brown agreed to act as an intermediary, simply handing over the shipment to a British contact.

The court heard that within four months of Brown's arrest, in early December last year, Benjamin was seized in a separate operation as he drove his Honda Accord on the M1 back to Bradford from West Bromwich.

When they stopped the car, officers saw Benjamin "attempting to hide something in his jeans" and found 21 packages of crack cocaine worth up to £80,000.

Robin Frieze, for Benjamin, said he agreed to ferry the shipment for £1,000 in a bid to pay off debts.

He said: "The business was struggling after Richard Brown was locked up and he was struggling."

Benjamin also owed money for expensive infertility treatment he and his wife had undergone, said Mr Frieze.

"He is a decent man who got involved in something far beyond his own criminality. It was not offending he went looking for."

Benjamin, 34, of Hawes Road, Little Horton, Bradford, was jailed for eight years after admitting possessing crack cocaine with the intent to supply and conspiring to pervert the course of justice.

Judge John Spencer, QC, told him: "You have people who will speak up for you as someone who is a benefit to the community."

But he added he was satisfied of Benjamin's "serious involvement" in drugs and that only a long sentence could be passed.

Curtis 29, of Mount Pleasant Lane, Clapton, London, admitted possessing cocaine with intent to supply cocaine and was jailed for seven years.

Griscombe, 49, of Polsbrook Road, Duckmanton, Derbyshire, admitted obstructing the police and received a one month jail sentence, suspended for one year.

Brown, 38, of Thornleigh Gardens, Leeds, has admitted supplying cocaine and conspiring to pervert the course of justice and was due to be sentenced today.

In July 2000, the Young Lion Caf was the scene of a bloody gang battle which saw 27-year-old Jamaican student Destor Coleman shot dead.