- Junkie had a little lamb, its fleece was white as snow...
The police can sometimes have difficulties determining if somebody is under the influence of drugs. In this case, there wasn’t a shred of doubt about that.
After all, most sober people do not have a lamb eating fries in the backseat of their car.
British citizens John McNeil and Lindsey Sangster received sentences for drug-related crimes. The moment they got busted is one the attending officers will probably never forget.
The police caught McNeil and Sangster during a traffic stop. In the car, they found drug paraphernalia and thousands of dollars’ worth of cocaine and heroin.
Yet, that wasn’t the strangest thing in the vehicle. In the backseat was a small lamb, eating some leftover French fries.
It was later revealed that the baby sheep had come from a Scottish farm. McNeil and Sangster, however, claimed they’d rescued the lamb from wandering in the middle of the road.
They also claimed that its name was Pablo, after the Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. Somehow, I don’t believe Scottish farmers would name their sheep that.
Now, McNeil has been sentenced to community service, while an arrest warrant was issued for Sangster, who failed to show up in court. Pablo, meanwhile, is safe in his home.
Big Drug Bust
McNeil’s and Sangster’s arrest took place several years ago, on April 22, 2023. At the time, they were traveling on the M74 highway in Scotland in a Volkswagen Golf, with Sangster in the driver’s seat.
The police didn’t say what exactly happened, but Sergeant Nick Twigg testified in court that he’d “had reason to stop” the vehicle. We can only assume that driving may have been a bit erratic.
As the cops stopped the car, they found Sangster at the wheel, McNeil riding shotgun, and an unidentified second man in the backseat. According to the three, they were returning to Ayrshire from Edinburgh, having shown the man in the back a car he was planning to purchase.
However, the cops became suspicious due to Sangster’s strange behavior. Twigg stated that she appeared “nervous” and jittery.
“She kept on looking ahead when talking to me and darting her eyes to the side,” he told the court, according to STV.
The two were ordered out of the car, and a drug dog called Billy was brought in. Under the passenger seat, Billy discovered copious amounts of drugs.
In the car was 4,640 pounds ($6,158) worth of cocaine and 10,050 pounds ($13,338) of heroin. Although they claimed to know nothing about the drugs, the cops arrested McNeil and Sangster.
Wayward Lamb
But let’s address the elephant in the room – by which I mean the lamb in the backseat. In the back of the car, next to the unnamed man, was a small lamb munching away on a “poke of chips.”
That is, a takeaway portion of French-fried potatoes.
McNeil and Sangster stated that the lamb was called Pablo after the late Colombian drug kingpin Pablo Escobar. They claimed that they’d found the sheep wandering a road and picked it up to take it to safety.
Sangster told the cops that she was a “trainee shepherdess.” McNeil, meanwhile, stated he’d worked on farms in his youth and knew how to safely handle animals.
Fortunately for the lamb, it carried identification tags. That information traced it to North Linrigg Farm east of Glasgow, owned by Kirsty Mair.
Mair testified that she had not given McNeil or Sangster permission to be in possession of Pablo. How they came to have the animal has not been disclosed.
Maybe it had really run away from the farm; who knows? I’m pretty confident, though, that this Scottish farm would not have named its animals after a dead drug lord.
Anyway, Pablo was fortunately in alright shape, if a bit dehydrated and hungry. The cops arranged for the lamb to go to a nearby farm while they arranged for his return home.
Day in Court
In early November 2026, McNeil appeared before a court in Glasgow for his sentencing. The amount of drugs he had been transporting was so enormous, that the court determined that it had been intended for resale.
McNeil had previous drug charged, but the judge took leniency on him. Sheriff Tony Kelly (not a sheriff like in the U.S.) sentenced McNeil to 300 hours of unpaid community service instead of jail. He must also wear a tracker bracelet and remain in his home between 8 p.m. and 5 a.m. for the next six months.
Sangster did not show up for her date in court. As such, Kelly granted a warrant for her arrest.
But what of Pablo, if that is his name? He returned home to North Linrigg Farm and is doing well, playing with his new lamb friends, said Mair.
“Moral of the story? Maybe it pays to tag lambs early,” she mused.
“Or maybe it is a lesson to drug dealers if you want to be inconspicuous, don’t steal a lamb and have it in the back of a car going down the motorway.”