A drug dealer's DNA was discovered on the trigger of a sawn-off shotgun that was found during a police raid at a home in the Midlands. The weapon had been wrapped in a towel and concealed inside a holdall at a flat in Bestwood on March 8, 2025.
Police confirmed the shortened bolt-action shotgun was a viable firearm and subjected it to forensic testing to determine who had handled it. Tests revealed that Dante Shakespeare's DNA was present on the trigger.
Criminal proceedings were already underway against the 19-year-old for offenses he committed as a juvenile. In June 2023, police stopped a car in which Shakespeare was a passenger and discovered an unsheathed machete. The weapon was seized, and officers later found that Shakespeare had been dealing heroin, cocaine, and cannabis between December 2022 and June 10, 2023.
Shakespeare pleaded guilty to multiple charges at Nottingham Crown Court in February 2026, including possession of a firearm without a certificate, possessing a knife in a public place, and supplying class A and B drugs. He was sentenced to three and a half years in a young offenders' institution on April 24, 2026.
Detective Constable Thomas Lowe of Nottinghamshire Police said: "It really shouldn't need me to explain just how dangerous it was for this gun to be where it was. Dante Shakespeare was involved in handling this viable firearm and ensuring it was placed inside the flat – a decision that put everyone in the vicinity at risk of harm. Thanks to some great work from our policing teams, we were able to forensically link Shakespeare to the weapon, after his DNA was found on the trigger. Being in possession of an illegal firearm is an incredibly serious offense, as is supplying drugs and carrying bladed weapons. Shakespeare did all three of these things, so thoroughly deserves the custodial sentence that has now been passed against him."
