YouTube rappers jailed after cash, class A drugs and shotguns found
A Black Country drug dealer and two friends have been jailed after class A drugs and sawn-off shotguns were found.
The three men have been jailed for more than 35 years in total after they appeared in a YouTube video glamorising drugs and guns.
After being caught with a loaded pistol at a fast food restaurant in Birmingham in 2016, Remi Carty, of High Street in Stourbridge, was on licence from prison.
In September 2018 police raided a property in Redhill Road, Northfield, where CCTV showed 20-year-old Carty fleeing in his socks as police arrived.
Officers found a "large quantity" of class A drugs, a loaded 9mm pistol, a sawn-off shotgun and two bags full of ammunition that were hidden in a shed in the back garden.
Fingerprints at the site also connected Carty's friend, 21-year-old Shaun Barnhurst, to the find.
Two months later armed police stopped an Audi S3, driven by Barnhurst, at his home address in Acorn Gardens in Stirchley, and found 71 wraps of heroin and a lock knife.
Police then searched a grey Seat Leon parked on Barnhurst's driveway, stolen in a burglary in Warwickshire six days earlier, and found a sawn-off shotgun, crack cocaine, heroin, and a large quantity of cash.
Barnhurst was arrested, and a man that had fled the vehicle as officers approached was later identified as Carty.
During the police investigation, a third man, Kyle Esty, retrieved items from a wheelie bin at Barnhurst's address and between November 2018 and January 2019 the 22-year-old made "several street-level" drug deals.
He was arrested on January 29 and was found with 90 wraps of class A drugs on him, with more discovered at his address in Sherbourne Street, Northfield, alongside a drug dealing kit and cash.
Carty was also tracked down and arrested earlier that month.
DCI Ronan Tyrer, from the force's Regional Organised Crime Unit, said: “This has been a protracted investigation but diligent phone, investigative, CCTV and forensic work showed these three were all acting together in this criminal enterprise of conspiring to supply drugs and, in the case of Carty and Barnhurst, possessing firearms.
“They had a friendship spanning many years, which was evidenced on their mobile devices, including the YouTube video where they rap about shootings, cash, drugs and the police.
"Carty and Barnhurst were childhood friends and went to school together.
"But that friendship evolved into criminality and I am pleased with the sentences handed out today, which will put a stop to their activities for the foreseeable future."
Carty was sentenced to 15 years in prison for conspiracy to possess firearms and conspiracy to supply class A drugs, after pleading guilty on June 7.
Barnhurst was also sentenced to 15 years after pleading guilty on December 13 last year to possession with intent to supply firearms and ammunition, and possession with intent to supply class A drugs.
Esty pleaded guilty on February 27 to conspiracy to supply and possession with intent to supply class A drugs, and was sentenced to six years and nine months in prison.
All three were sentenced at Birmingham Crown Court on Monday July 8.
