It’s just gone midday at a north London Wetherspoons and Selamet Mehmetaj sips a Coke as he calmly outlines how his multi-million-pound trade in potent cannabis works.
The drug baron, whose £50,000 Mercedes-Benz without a front number plate is parked nearby, has agreed to meet potential new clients after they contacted him via the anonymous Instagram page that advertises his business.
Unconcerned by other drinkers and passing pedestrians in the bustling Wood Green town centre, the 28-year-old explains how every month he supplies dealers across the UK with 2,500 high strength cannabis plants and harvests buds for them to sell.
Drug baron Selamet Mehmetaj, nicknamed ‘The Devil’, was selling high strength cannabis plants through his anonymous Instagram page ‘Albanian Blood’
And he makes very clear what happens to those who dare to cross him, matter-of-factly boasting how he chopped off two fingers of one client who failed to pay – and got his money before he chopped off a foot.
Meet ‘The Devil’, who is raking in millions from his wholesale drug-dealing business. On his Instagram page titled ‘Albanian Blood’, Mehmetaj has been showing off his cannabis factories and posting videos to highlight what strains are available, encouraging new customers to get in touch.
Instagram removed the page after being contacted by the Daily Mail.
But while the page was still live, undercover Mail journalists posing as customers made contact via the social media app.
Mehmetaj met them near his home in Palmers Green. During the meeting, he:
- Bragged that he dodged a firearms charge despite police finding a Russian gun he’d smuggled in from Albania and hidden in his car, saying his solicitor had cooked up a story claiming the gun wasn’t his.
- Splurged the cash from his illicit business on a bling lifestyle including a £50,000 Mercedes-Benz CLA AMG, an Audi RS7 – which he drives at over 200mph on motorways using fake plates – and a Formula 3 car for off-road racing.
- Laughed as he described how police missed a stash of cocaine, cannabis and bullets when they raided his five-bedroom flat because they failed to search one room.
Mehmetaj, who is from the northern Albanian town of Tropoja, has developed a thriving drugs empire in the UK – and a social media following to promote it.
The Daily Mail undercover reporter exposed Mehmetaj’s thriving drugs empire in the UK
Although his Instagram page titled Gjak Shqipez, which means Albanian Blood, was deleted, his other pages, which do not promote cannabis, remain active.
After an undercover reporter messaged the Albanian Blood account inquiring about buying cannabis wholesale, he agreed to meet at a cafe.
Arriving in his blacked-out Mercedes-Benz CLA AMG, he told how his business had boomed during lockdown because everyone was at home.
Mehmetaj explained how every month he grows up to 2,500 cannabis plants – which he calls his ‘babies’ – including high strength ‘stardog’ and the super-potent ‘wedding cake’.
He said he sells each plant for £10-15 in batches of up to 300, and boxes of harvested cannabis by the kilogram.
According to Mehmetaj, the business makes him millions a year, but when sold on by dealers the plants would be worth tens or even hundreds of millions of pounds.
He said ‘many people call me’ for orders, adding: ‘Today they called me and somebody wants 200, somebody wants 300.
‘I have people who take every single month from me for their warehouses.’
Mehmetaj sells high-strength cannabis to wholesale dealers across the UK via Instagram
Instagram played a major role in advertising his business, Mehmetaj said, explaining nobody knew he was behind the Albanian Blood page which had almost 1,000 followers.
To drive traffic to it, he posted links and pictures from the account on another Instagram page with 12,000 followers.
This more popular page shows off his cars and cash, mocks the police and links to a rap video he stars in called Gangster Love.
Other rap songs he has produced under the name Memz are available on Spotify and Apple Music.
In his online profile, he is called ‘the Devil’, he said, because ‘that’s what they call me’.
He said: ‘I shared [Albanian Blood links] from my big Instagram and everyone knows me so they saw the page and many people were interested in it and said, “Yeah, we want to buy it”.’
After clients contacted him via Albanian Blood he took their numbers then arranged to meet in person which is ‘safer’ than sending messages online.
He said that if someone breaks his trust ‘it’s gunna be very bad’ and in a thinly veiled warning, described his treatment of a client who didn’t pay.
After using a mutual friend to lure the client into a meeting, his gang bundled him into a van, he said.
‘I took him from Stoke-on-Trent all the way down to London, I put him in a weed house basement, beat him up three times a day, he didn’t give me no alternative, I cut off two of his fingers,’ Mehmetaj said.
‘I said you’ve got 24 hours to make a phone call, find the money anywhere in this planet, I don’t care.’
He said he also contacted the man’s relatives, and told them: ‘I’ve cut two of his fingers. Next thing is going to be his foot.’
When he eventually paid, Mehmetaj told him: ‘This should be a scar in your life and a reminder to what happens when you f*** about someone who’s true.’
He added: ‘I did that to that guy then I went in the evening and I slept like a baby. I did not care.
‘My stress was that I couldn’t sleep until I got him.
‘My stress was that I have to have him in my hand. Once I have in my hand he has no chance.’
Social media posts from Mehmetaj also warn of his violence, with a disturbing Facebook video posted in March showing a man with a bloodied face whimpering as he is hit in the back of the car.
An accompanying comment states: ‘This is what happens to those who try to steal from us.’
Another violent video from February shows a terrified man apparently held captive in a house being slapped.
The video is accompanied by an expletive-filled warning.
And one post on his ‘Albanian Blood’ Instagram page featured a picture of a hooded man.
The caption read: ‘We caught this burglar inside the cannabis house.
‘The Albanian put him in a car and cut him to pieces. What do you think?’
Mehmetaj also told the undercover reporter how in April 2020 he was arrested after police found a Russian PK machine gun hidden under the gearbox in his Mercedes-Benz.
But after 48 hours in jail he said he got out, partly because he only ever handled the gun with gloves.
He claimed that it must have been hidden in the car without him knowing since he bought it in 2018.
He added: ‘However, they arrested the guy who sold it to me… I think he’s gunna get five years.’
On Instagram, he posted a picture of him posing with a different gun in front of his car.
During the investigation into the Russian gun, police turned his house upside down, he said.
But they searched the wrong room and missed a stash of cocaine, cannabis and bullets, he said.
Describing his lifestyle, he boasted about his cars and said a fortnight ago he drove his Audi RS7 at 230mph on the M1.
In one Instagram post, he films himself driving at over 140mph in his Mercedes-Benz. He avoids speeding fines by using fake plates which he routinely changes.
At the end of the meeting, he roared off in his Mercedes-Benz, jumping a red light despite a police car parked nearby.
His social media pages show more evidence of him mocking the law.
On Facebook in March, he posted footage taken by a friend of him being searched by police because there was a ‘strong smell of cannabis’ coming out of his car.
He added a series of laughing emojis and the comment: ‘Hey chief I do not have hashish in my car.’
In another post from the same month, he films himself mocking police as he drives past officers attending a motorway crash.
Mehmetaj declined to comment.
We alerted Scotland Yard about Mehmetaj and have offered to pass on more information.
***
Read more at DailyMail.co.uk