Hollyoaks has recently announced that Ripper Street star Benjamin O’Mahony is set to join the Channel 4 soap for a county lines drug story.
Benjamin joins the show as part of a year-long look at the issue surrounding children being exploited by criminal gangs.
A special hour-long episode will air next week showing teens, Juliet Nightingale and Sid Sumner, leaving their hometown to deliver drugs before discovering how dangerous the criminal world can be.
O’Mahony, known for portraying the role of DS Frank Thatcher in Ripper Street, will join Hollyoaks in the coming weeks as Victor, the county line boss, who is more senior than Jordan Price.
(Image: LIMEPICTURES)
Jordan who has been appearing in the Chester village since December has already gone on to groom Juliet and Sid to work for him.
But it soon becomes apparent that Victor is the real mastermind.
Speaking about his character O’Mahony claimed he is “arguably a sociopath” and will be willing to do whatever it takes to get what he wants.
(Image: BBC/Tiger Aspect 2016/Bernard Walsh)
“I would argue that Victor sees himself as an efficient businessman working within a violent industry, but there is also another side to him that is addicted to the power and loves to see the fear in people’s eyes.”
However, he has also admitted that he wasn’t familiar with the term county lines before producers from the hit show contacted his agent but claims the opportunity “sounded too juicy to pass up.”
Opening up about his new role, he added: “Victor is a complex character with a dark past and those are the parts that are always the most satisfying to play.
(Image: Cynon Valley Leader)
“In my day-to-day life, I’m not [luckily] like Victor so it’s about finding ways to empathise with a man who does some rather awful things to some very vulnerable people.”
County lines is a phrase used when gangs from different cities infiltrate smaller towns and often exploit younger people.
Bosses on the show have worked with The Children’s Society and said that they wanted to “get beyond the headlines, beyond the crime statistics and police reports, and to look at the impact on real families and real children.”
A special hour-long episode will air on April 14th, on Channel 4.
