What is your understanding of ‘County Lines’

[ScarletWitchM]

I’ve read and heard different definitions of what ‘County Lines’ is.

what is it you think / believe/ understand County Lines to mean?

I’m not in the UK. So while not up to date on what certain activities are called there, I’m absolutely not uneducated.

I never said it was slang, just that that phrasing isn’t in use where I live.

thanks for the kindness though!

If you’re in another country and it’s not a word you use why would you declare not knowing it makes you naive? Makes no sense.

The bbc county lines film is really disturbing but very factual.
Junior Smart is a county lines survivor who runs training for professionals. He is v interesting and explains the language like a 'bando' for example.

None of this is true.

@LovePoppy it's in use everywhere as OFSTED inspect schools and specifically ask schools what they are doing to educate kids on it.

County lines are literally the phone lines used between typically city drug dealers and rural locations. Generally younger and vulnerable adults and children are recruited and exploited to keep the ‘business’ going. It’s horrifying in part because the more you find out about them, you see how people find themselves in these situations and don’t realise until it’s too late and they don’t feel they have a safe way out. Or they honestly believe the people exploiting them are their friends and are on their side. And it’s not as easy to just arrest the bad guys as you’d want or hope either. It’s just terrifying and makes me fear for my own children.

Okay I’ll pass on to my detective sister 😂

Used to work in a secure unit and the amount of children in there for welfare being recruited for county lines was unbelievable 😢 most of the kids where befriended, asked to do a one of drop and then couldn't get out of the deal! All for a few nice tracksuits and trainers. They normally go for the children with a chaotic life, i.e., in foster care, single parent with a demanding job, and never really at home as always at work! They are too deep in the game before they realise what's happened

Absolutely this! They build trust before the train to 300 miles away journeys start

My understanding is that a dealer targets a vulnerable teen.
Example..
Dealer targets kid.
Offers them £100 to carry £20 bag of weed to an address 5 minutes away.
It's already planned for kid to be mugged whilst carrying the weed and money.
He now owes dealer £130 with no way of being able to repay the deals and money made/owed get bigger and bigger.
The kid becomes more scared of the gang he has been dragged into then the police or his parents and see's no way out.
This is how was explained to me by a policeman friend.
There was a poem/short story wrote explaining this called.. There's no such thing as a free chicken. (Referencing the fact that sometimes these debts start with a free KFC and end in a child owning a gang/dealer 1000s of pounds)
Just to add my friend told me it's not just boys, girls are dragged into it.
A lot of missing teens you see on Facebook ect are because of county Lines.
As far as I'm aware the term county lines is referencing the train lines across the country. The kids that get dragged into this use trains to carry drugs.

It's not always children either. Quite a few of the more independent adults with learning disabilities that I work with have also been recruited/threatened and made to do this. Not so much to distribute the stuff but to store it for distribution. I've just found a shed load under the bed of a learning disabled chap I see, for the second time. He lives in sheltered accommodation more or less independently. Last time the police removed it and told him off. He's obviously much less scared of the police than the dealer up line from him. Rightly so I guess.

It's absolutely true in the market town and villages near me.