2023-07-31
'Scourge' of Sligo gets 11 years for directing organised crime
Stage: Sentence
Plea: Guilty
Outcome: Mr Justice Hunt set the headline sentence at 16 years but due to mitigating factors, including Young's early guilty plea, he reduced that to 12 years. Following the sentence, Chief Superintendent Aidan Glacken told media gathered outside court that "Barry Young has been involved in the sale and distribution of controlled drugs for the last 20 years. "He directed and controlled a very large organised crime gang involved in an illegal business in the northwest of the country and this gang had substantial international links. "In the pursuit of greed and in the pursuit of money, this organised crime gang has caused much harm, much stress, much destruction to society and families through their reckless nature. "Many of those families have suffer