TWO brothers have been ordered to pay back thousands for their roles at the centre of a drug dealing gang.

Ryan Quinnell, 27, and Reece Quinnell, 24, were stopped in a car driving without lights in Crawley.

Police then found the duo with drugs in the car and at their addresses.

Along with Liam Samels, 25, the gang had been selling drugs like cocaine, MDMA, Ketamine, Diazepam and Phenazapam with an estimated potential street value of up to £115,000.

Raids on their homes found more than £13,000 cash.

Now after the trio were jailed, their assets have been seized.

Ryan, of Antlands Lane, Shipley Bridge, was found to have benefitted to the tune of £260,000.

After being jailed at Lewes Crown Court for nine years and seven months, he was ordered to cough-up more than £17,000 recovered by the police within the next three months, or face an extra six months in prison.

Reece, of the same address, was jailed for nine years and had benefited to the tune of £90,000. He was ordered to pay up £1,940 confiscated from his assets.

Samels, of Peterhouse Parade, Crawley, was jailed for two years and four months, and had enjoyed an £86,000 earner. Police seized £2,230 of identified assets from him.

Detective Inspector Mark O’Brien said: “Criminals need to know that where we think they have profits, hidden though they may be, we don’t give up after sentencing. Financial investigation is increasingly at the heart of criminal investigation.

“These confiscation orders come from the continued hard work by our officers, and in particular our expert financial investigators.

“Wherever possible we now target not just the criminals but also the profits of their crimes, whether they are from drug dealing or any other form of criminal activity. It can take time and each investigation results in an application for a court-authorised confiscation order.

“Often in such cases the assets currently available are less than the amount originally stolen, but that still isn’t the end of the matter.

“It is really important to make clear that we still keep records of all confiscation orders where the full benefit amount isn’t immediately available and we have means of regularly checking to identify any additional assets which have been obtained since the original order was made.

“We can then apply to the court for an increase in the original order. We also have the help of the South East Regional Asset Confiscation Enforcement (Ace) team, part of the South East Regional Organised Crime Unit (Serocu) who carry out further work to identify yet more assets.

.”Any funds obtained through POCA confiscation or cash forfeiture orders go to the central Government exchequer. However a proportion of this is returned to law enforcement.

“Sussex Police receive 50% cash back from cash forfeitures and 18.75% cash back from seized confiscation orders.

“POCA funding received by Sussex Police is then distributed equally between the Police & Crime Commissioner and the force.

“We currently employ extra Financial Investigators and Financial Intelligence Officers from part of these funds to continue the fight in seizing criminal assets, with the remainder being used to support local crime reduction and diversion projects.”