EVEN from inside prison and in hiding abroad, the Cullen brothers continue to hit the headlines in their hometown.

Their involvement in the case of Billy Jones and the grenade under the car is one of the most intriguing but puzzling aspects of what is already a remarkable story.

It begins, initially, with the moment of their downfall in January 2018.

Anthony Cullen was arrested in a series of dawn raids, and jailed for 27 years a year later, as police broke up the drugs gang he headed.

Around 50kg of cocaine and several firearms were seized.

However twin brother Leon Cullen evaded capture and managed to flee the country, remaining at large today.

The following month, the windows of his house on Honister Avenue in Orford were bricked and a BMW on the driveway torched.

But the link between these events and the two other incidents that formed part of the prosecution’s case – the grenade being planted outside a family home on Cleveland Road in Orford, and an arson attack on Smithy’s Gym in Bewsey – is unclear.

While the fire at the Bewsey Road gym – owned by Shaun Smith, star of Netflix series Bare Knuckle Fight Club and Vice documentary the UK’s Scariest Debt Collector – preceded the attacks on Leon Cullen’s home by two days, the grenade find came just hours afterwards.

Police theorise that Cullen’s windows being put through and car being torched came in response to the arson.

Jones and Leon Cullen certainly moved in the same circles, with two of the former's close associates having been school friends of the latter.

And the defendant was described in court as being 'subservient' in the grenade plot - although to whom he was subservient is another question.

Ultimately, the evidence point to the grenade being planted was a warning on behalf of Leon Cullen – either ordered from wherever in the world he is exiled, or without his knowledge but in his interests.

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However, no prosecutions have resulted from anything other than the explosives and the culprits of the other attacks - and the brains behind the grenade attack - therefore remain unknown and at large.