TWO Little Lever men — who earned £78,392 through drug supply — have been ordered to pay back more than £30,000.

The men were part of a group of 13 drug dealers who were convicted of supplying cannabis around the UK following a trial at Northampton Crown Court in 2012.

Lee Smyth, aged 35, from Church Road, was sentenced to 12 months and ordered to repay £18,892.50.

He is believed to have earned £52,382 through his criminal activity.

Joe Hughes, aged 31, of Victory Road, was given an eight months suspended sentence and 180 hours community service and was ordered to pay back £13,005 He is believed to have earned £26,010.

Both men were found guilty of conspiracy to provide Class B drugs.

In total, the group of 12 men and one woman is thought to have collectively earned £7.8 million.

They were sentenced to a total of 64 years in prison and now, Northampton Crown Court has ordered more than £109,000 to be seized from the group.

Any future income or assets the group acquire can potentially be confiscated as their debt will remain on record for life, or until it is fully repaid.

An investigation found they were connected to a group who had conspired to supply Class B drugs in the UK and Northern Ireland.

The investigation, led by the East Midlands special operations unit, uncovered the large scale supply of cannabis and cannabis resin, which was sourced from the West Midlands and the North West of England.

EMSOU worked with Northamptonshire, West Midlands, Greater Manchester and Lancashire police forces to arrest the offenders in April 2011.

Det Insp Greg Maides, who led the investigation, said: “Establishing how much criminals made from their crime is essential to ensuring that they really do pay their debt to society.

“A prison sentence may deprive them of their liberty for some considerable time, but it is important that they cannot continue to benefit from money and assets acquired through criminal activity.

“Clearly, it would be ideal to recover every penny an offender makes from crime, but the reality is that quite often that money has been spent.”