Disturbing texts show a British gunrunner ordering a hitman to 'melt the face' of a rival with acid - unaware police were reading every one.
Philip Waugh is among hundreds of gang bosses now in jail after police hacked into EncroChat, an encrypted communication platform used by criminals.
The 39-year-old exhibits shocking sadism, urging an associate to blind the victim and stab him in the leg so he is unable to run to a sink to wash his face.
Waugh is also seen blithely admitting that a 'pineapple' - slang for a grenade - had been let outside the home of one of his enemies on a residential street in Warrington.
After an associate asked him to remove it because a child lived inside the house, Waugh dismisses his concerns and writes: 'It's in god's hands now.'
