Drug dealer set to pay back just £2,500 of his £119,000 profits
A man caught with a large amount of cannabis ready for sale reaped benefits of £119,000 from drug dealing, a court has heard.
Reece Youles, of Cabboms Crescent, Stanford-le-Hope in Essex, but is previously from Rathlin Close, Corby, made the huge amount of money from peddling cannabis.
He pleaded guilty last year to possession with intent to supply cannabis after police found him in August 2022 in Kettering with a large amount of the Class B drug. He was sentenced at Northampton Crown Court last month.
Proceeds of crime act (POCA) proceedings against him were completed at the same court yesterday (Thursday, September 12).
Recorder Jonathan Dee said that Youles, 27, was estimated to have made £119,425 in cash and benefits from drug dealing. But police had only been able to recover £2,570. This was cash they found on Youles when he was arrested and was deemed by the prosecution to be the only amount recoverable at this time.
He did not contest the POCA proposal in court.
Recorder Dee said: “You have had the good sense to agree everything and that goes in your credit.
"You benefited from more than £100,000 from criminal activity.
"Any time in the next six years the police can come to you for that amount.”
Youles was also ordered to pay a £187 victim surcharge.
The Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 allows the government to recover criminal assets by confiscating money and property deemed to have been bought with the proceeds of crime. Last year £339m in assets were recovered by the scheme across the UK.