Boasting Leeds Festival dealer and youth worker said booming business was 'priceless'
A drug dealer who boasted that business was “priceless” at the Leeds Festival has been handed more than three years’ jail.
Dominic Ford appeared at Leeds Crown Court after he was caught at the Bramham Park event in August 2024.
The 27-year-old qualified youth worker admitted being concerned in the supply of MDMA, dealing in ketamine, possession of cocaine, cannabis and diazepam, and possession of criminal property.
The judge, Recorder McKone KC told him: “You knew it would be easy to sell drugs to young people.
“You must have known that on at least two previous years that people have died at the festival from taking MDMA.
“The public must know that anyone caught dealing drugs at Leeds Festival will go to prison.”
Prosecutor Esther Bukoye said that Ford was at the three-day music festival on August 23, 2024, when he approached an undercover security officer and asked him if he “wanted anything”.
The officer asked him what he had, and he told him he had ketamine.
He was arrested, searched and found to be in possession of cannabis, cocaine, ketamine and diazepam. They were worth £433 in total.
He also had £140 in cash. His mobile phone was confiscated and they found messages related to dealing, including the message in which he boasted about “festival season starting” and it being “priceless” in terms of the profits to be made.
Ford, of Toppham Drive, Sheffield, refused to answer police questions.
The court heard he was already on an 18-month suspended sentence for unlawful wounding, imposed in August 2023. The drug-dealing offences put him in breach of that sentence.
Mitigating, Sophie Lamb said Ford had prepared himself for custody, bringing his possessions to court.
She said: “He saw an opportunity to make money at the festival, it does appear to be a one-off. He regrets it.”
She said he wanted help for his drug use and mental-health issues.
Recorder McKone told Ford: “You made a deliberate decision to travel from Sheffield where you live in order to breach that suspended sentence by drug dealing at the Leeds Festival.
“You knew very well the risks you were taking.”
He jailed him for 31 months, and activated nine months of his suspended sentence, making a total of 40 months’ jail.