David Allen Young, Carjacking & Methamphetamine Trafficking, West Virginia 2016

CHARLESTON, W.Va. – In a brazen crime spree, a local man was sentenced to a decade in federal prison for his role in multiple carjackings and a large-scale methamphetamine trafficking network.

David Allen Young, 24, was handed a 10-year prison term for his crimes, which took place in Putnam and Kanawha counties. The sentencing occurred on Wednesday, but the crime spree began in the summer of 2014 and continued until January 2016.

According to court documents, Young was part of a massive methamphetamine trafficking network, receiving at least 40 pounds of crystal methamphetamine from his sources and distributing it to individuals in and around Kanawha County.

The carjackings began on January 24, 2016, when Young stole a Ford Expedition in Putnam County and fired a shot at an occupied vehicle in St. Albans. Later that day, he approached a Ford Edge SUV on foot near the intersection of Big Tyler Road and Waycross Drive in Cross Lanes.

Young pointed a 9 mm handgun at a man occupying the SUV and ordered him to get out of the vehicle. The man complied, and Young got into the Ford Edge and drove away. Young continued his crime spree, pointing the same handgun at another man and his juvenile son in a Chevrolet S-10 truck in Cross Lanes.

Young was eventually arrested on January 26, 2016. The investigation into the drug conspiracy was handled by the FBI and the Charleston Police Department’s Special Enforcement Unit, while the carjackings were investigated by the Kanawha County Sheriff’s Department.

Assistant United States Attorney Haley Bunn is in charge of the prosecution. United States District Judge John T. Copenhaver, Jr., imposed the sentence.

This case was prosecuted as part of an ongoing effort to combat the illicit sale and misuse of illegal drugs, including methamphetamine. The U.S. Attorney’s Office, joined by federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies, is committed to aggressively pursuing and shutting down pill trafficking, eliminating open-air drug markets, and curtailing the spread of illegal drugs in communities across the Southern District.

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