Waltzers worker at Leeds Festival caught selling cocaine as part of a team
A fairground worker who tried to hide his drugs on a ride was found to be working in a team of dealers selling cocaine at inflated prices.
Shane Buck was working the waltzers at this year’s Leeds Festival when security staff became suspicious of him.
He was found with £1,860 worth of cocaine and then lied to police that he bought the drugs on the site.
The 51-year-old was jailed at Leeds Crown Court this week after he admitted one offence of dealing in Class A drugs.
Prosecutor Deborah Smithies said that when security approached the fair worker at the Bramham Park festival on August 21, he appeared to hide a bag in one of the seats of the waltzers.
It was recovered and contained 21 individual half-gramme deals of cocaine. Another bag weighing just over five grammes was found on Buck.
Selling the drugs at £60 for half a gramme, the drugs were worth £1,860 in total. Due to the enclosed nature of the festival and young attendees, dealers often target revellers and sell drugs at inflated prices.
Buck also had £310 in cash on him and an iPhone with messages providing clear evidence of organised drug-selling at the festival between Buck and other dealers.
He later told police during interview that he had bought the drugs at the music festival with the purpose of selling them on. He also said he had brought the recovered money with him, despite the event being cashless.
Buck, of Corporation Road, Beverley, East Yorkshire, has 11 previous convictions for 43 offences, although none for drugs.
Mitigating, Shannon Woodley said Buck had managed to stay out of trouble for the past 23 years and that he was not an “entrenched drug dealer”.
She said he remained in full-time employment and his job would remain open for him.
Judge Ray Singh told him: “You pre-planned, together with others, to go to the Leeds Festival this year - a captive audience of thousands of young individuals.
“This was not an insignificant amount of drugs.”
He jailed Buck for 28 months.