An investigation reveals a convicted drug dealer's connection to firms that purchased land ahead of Traveller groups, who then carried out unauthorized developments over bank holidays. The scheme involves buying greenfield sites, using heavy machinery during weekends when councils are closed, and applying for retrospective planning permission. TheDaily Mail alerted authorities to prevent further illegal construction.
A convicted drug dealer is linked to a group of companies that are buying traveller 'land grab' targets before bulldozers turn up and transform the green fields into tarmac building sites, the Daily Mail can reveal.
Work with heavy machinery began at a site in West Chiltington, in West Sussex, on Friday, near the world-renowned English sparkling wine estate Nyetimber. It carried on throughout the weekend in the picturesque village, despite Horsham District Council issuing temporary stop notices designed to ban any further development. It was the same tactics used by a team of about 30 travellers in the hamlet of Willows Green, near Felsted, Essex, on Friday May 1.
Locals were left watching in horror as travellers used construction vehicles to concreted over a field. In both cases, the councils were alerted by the Daily Mail in advance that it was about to happen. It is part of a trend that sees travellers build unauthorised developments over long weekends when council enforcement teams are at home. They then apply for retrospective planning permission in a bid to make them permanent.
Now, we can also reveal that the same people, who are not thought to be part of the traveller community, are behind a group of companies that bought both West Chiltington and Willows Green sites for cash last year. Chad Brady, a 31-year-old Yorkshireman, is pictured here outside Hull Crown Court last April. He admitted possessing cocaine with intent to supply and was given a two-year suspended prison sentence.
UK Real Estate and Land 2 Limited paid £125,000 for the land at Willows Green on April 29 2025. Just under three months later, on July 21, UK Real Estate and Land 1 Limited paid £200,000 for the West Chiltington site. There is a third firm - UK Real Estate and Land Limited - which has involved the same directors before they were all dissolved on April 28 this year, shortly before the unauthorised developments.
This followed voluntary strike-off applications, according to the Companies House register. All three firms were set up between November 2022 and May 2023 and only filed accounts for a dormant company. From the outset, Chad Brady, a 31-year-old Yorkshireman, was a key director. Brady was named at Hull Crown Court last year as the 'manager' of a lucrative cocaine dealing operation in the seaside town of Bridlington.
The shameless criminal recruited his own sister as a £150-a-day runner but was busted after sending bulk advertising messages to locals. He admitted possessing cocaine with intent to supply and was given a two-year suspended prison sentence, 200 hours of unpaid work and 10 days rehabilitation. Brady resigned as a director of all three firms last January, as the criminal court case was underway, and before the two significant land purchases.
He is the director of 17 other dissolved companies and three active ones, one of which describes itself as a yoga school. Uttlesford Council was warned a month before the Willows Green site was racked up that there were plans to import thousands of tonnes of hardcore to the field. It came after traveller Martin Mongan was seen using a Facebook group to arrange up to 150 lorry loads of aggregate.
A traveller site appeared over the last bank holiday weekend in the village of Willows Green, Essex. The field before, when it was described as a haven for wildlife including great-crested newts and rare albino fallow deer. When the Daily Mail asked the council on April 30 about the threat, it confirmed it was aware but said it could do nothing unless any development started.
However, fears of a second potential site on another field just 300 yards away from the first were raised during a tense packed meeting of the parish council earlier this month. The local authority successfully applied for an emergency High Court injunction after we alerted it to the fact the land had been purchased for £150,000 last July by a traveller from a family with a history of unauthorised development.
The injunctions ban named individuals and persons unknown from carrying out any development on the land, with the threat of imprisonment if it is breached. The second field at Willows Green was not developed over the last bank holiday.
Ahead of the bank holiday last week, we revealed how Karl Kavanagh, 48, boss of Hampshire-based KK Construction, had used the same Facebook group as Mr Mongan to try to secure large amounts of aggregates to be delivered to undisclosed sites in Horley and Horsham over the bank holiday weekend
Travellers Land Grab Unauthorized Development Drug Dealer Chad Brady UK Real Estate And Land Companies West Chiltington Willows Green Retrospective Planning Permission Horsham District Council Uttlesford Council Facebook Group Aggregates
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Convicted Drug Dealer Linked to Traveller Land Grab TacticA group of companies linked to a convicted drug dealer are buying traveller 'land grab' targets before bulldozers turn up and transform the green fields into tarmac building sites. The tactic has been used in West Chiltington, West Sussex, and Willows Green, Essex.
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