The first half of this chapter considers the complex set of inter-personal relationships between the user community and CL operatives starting with cuckooing and the development of a cuckooing typology. The second half of the chapter considers the views of both users and dealers as they offer insights into their often complex relationships and how they feel about county lines.

What is cuckooing?

The term ‘cuckooing’ borrows from the habits of the cuckoo bird which takes over the nests of other birds for its young. Essentially it is a form of criminal exploitation where vulnerable people are conned, coerced, controlled or intimidated into sharing, providing or offering up their accommodation to criminals (often drug dealers) who then use it to base their criminal activity (often drug dealing). Methods vary, however, intimidation and violence often underpin this. It is now widely associated with CL networks.

An alternative simple definition of cuckooing is provided by HMICFRS: A ‘tactic where a drug dealer (or network) takes over a vulnerable person's home to prepare, store or deal drugs. Commonly associated with exploitation and violence’ (HMICFRS, 2019b).

Cuckooing (Butera, 2013) is not new, but for years remained ‘hidden’ within housing or policing reports of ‘crack dens’ (Robinson and Flemen, 2002), largely overlooked or unrecognised as criminal exploitation and downplayed as a ‘type of manipulation’. From 2000 onwards its profile was raised with the BBC describing it (2008) as ‘a new type of crime which involves a drug dealer befriending a vulnerable individual who lives on their own. Like a cuckoo, the dealer moves in, takes over the property, and turns it into a drugs’ den’.

For certain criminal groups it proves an effective exploitation technique. Widely utilised within CL models, its recent expansion indicates widespread shifts of CL models to profit maximisation and competitive advantage.

The term itself it not ‘flagged’ within policing systems so no specific quantifiable data is retrievable from constabularies. The NCA first referred to cuckooing in its 2015 Intelligence Assessment (NCA 2015: 4) noting some CL operatives entering into relationships with vulnerable women to access their premises.