Queen’s Guards Busted for Alleged Cocaine and Money Laundering Scam Days Before Star Role in Jubilee

Royalist is The Daily Beast’s newsletter for all things royal and Royal Family. Subscribe here to get it in your inbox every Sunday.

The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Trooping the Color celebration will be lacking six soldiers from the Irish Guards after they were arrested along with a Coldstream Guard over an alleged drug ring. The men, who are under command of Prince William, the Duke of Cambridge, stand accused of dealing class A drugs and money laundering as part of a suspected cocaine racket.

“As part of a planned operation, the RMP arrested six Irish Guards soldiers and a Coldstream Guardsman veteran from across the UK on suspicion of conspiracy to supply drugs and money lending and laundering offences,” an Irish army spokesman said in a statement. “The Army does not tolerate any type of illegal or fraudulent behaviour. As this is now the subject of an independent RMP investigation, it is inappropriate to comment further.”

Inside the Queen’s Plan to Save Her Own Platinum JubileeTO THE RESCUE

Tom Sykes, Tim Teeman

Five of the seven men were reportedly released on bail, but they will not be taking part in the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations. The arrests, first reported by the British Sun, stem from what the tabloid described as a “loan shark operation” in which they allegedly loaned money at inflated interest rates and then laundered the payments.

The arrests—which were carried out in a series of raids in the U.K., Wales and Northern Ireland—come just weeks after Prince William presented the regiment with new colors and bestowed upon them the honor of leading the Trooping of the Colors celebrations to be held June 2 and will feature more than 1,200 soldiers and officers.

“They came in like the DEA—kicking down doors,” a source told the Sun. “There was no warning. We were told they had been planning the operation for months. It wasn’t just the barracks. They searched the soldiers’ homes offbase. It’s all come as a huge shock.”

Before the arrests Prince William told the Irish Guard he was “immensely proud” of what it had achieved, including service in Afghanistan, Cyprus, South Sudan, Kosovo and Iraq.