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Two Northern Ireland men who ran a drugs ‘party pack’ import export business using an online underworld known as Silk Road were jailed on Wednesday.

Ryan Michael Millligan, 29 and from Manse Road in Dundrum, Co Down and Ryan Thomas McManus, 31, from Ava Street in South Belfast were sentenced for over 40 drugs offences.

After pleading guilty to a range of offences committed over an 18-month period, both men were handed seven year sentences - half of which will be served in prison, with the remaining three and a half years on licence upon their release.

During today’s sentencing at Belfast Crown Court, it emerged that a third man who was facing two charges linked to the operation passed away last night.

Connor Devenney, 36, from Dunwellan Park in Newcastle, Co Down appeared in court last week when the Crown set out its case against the three men. However, Judge David McFarland was informed today that Devenney had died.

The pair were snared in an international operation involving the Serious Organised Crime Agency working with the FBI and the PSNI. When investigators arrested the men in August 2013, they seized almost 40 orders, containing 15 different Class A and B drugs, awaiting dispatch to customers in the US, Russia, Sweden, Ireland Greece, Israel as well as within the UK.

The two men used the ‘Silk Road’ to move illegal drugs including cocaine, MDMA, herbal cannabis and mephedrone into and out of the UK. Their associate Conor Devenney was employed as a courier.

Today during sentencing in Belfast Crown Court, Judge McFarland said: “This was a very detailed investigation on a major drug operation which had the potential to inflict major damage on the wider community.”

They used aliases Sonicdrone and Blackwater86 and would order the drugs through digital communication such as emails, website forums and instant messaging services, using suppliers in the Netherlands, China and North America. They paid with virtual currencies such as BitCoin or money transfer services. They also accepted Bitcoin as payment from their customers.

The National Crime Agency today told Belfast Live the drugs would be shipped to Northern Ireland through legitimate courier services to either ‘virtual’ addresses or to the address of a trusted associate. They would later be delivered by Devenney to Milligan or McManus.

Analysis of computers seized after their arrest showed they used the ‘Silk Road’ to advertise their services to the worldwide market. Evidence from the FBI’s operation against Silk Road in September 2013 showed they facilitated 300 “bespoke orders” in the 15 month period between May 2012 and July 2013. The transactions list showed they were dealing with clients in countries including Russia, Italy, India and Sweden.

When officers searched their properties, they seized phones, computers, iPads, passports and banking details, printers, packaging and large quantities of controlled drugs including cannabis, ecstasy, 4-MEC, amphetamine and LSD substitute tablets with the face of ‘Sponge Bob Square Pants’ printed on them.

All three men pleaded guilty at Belfast Crown Court earlier this year. Millligan pleaded guilty to 32 charges including - six counts of possession of Class A controlled drug with intent to supply; seven counts of possession of Class B controlled drug with intent to supply and money laundering.

McManus pleaded guilty to 36 charges including - six counts of possession of Class A controlled drug with intent to supply; seven counts of possession of Class B controlled drug with intent to supply and money laundering. Connor Devenney had pleaded guilty to two charges including one count of possession of Class B controlled drug.

NCA Operations Manager John Costley said: “Drugs destroy communities and anyone who thinks buying and selling them in the virtual world is safer than buying and selling them on the street is very mistaken. The National Crime Agency together with its partners, locally, nationally and internationally, will protect the UK public by pursuing those involved in serious organised crime and will put them before the courts.”

Defence barrister John McCrudden QC, acting for McManus, said his client came before the court with no criminal record, and had expressed remorse for his involvement.

Mr McCrudden said that within the prison context, his client - who started taking drugs in his youth - has completed a drugs awareness course and a victim impact programme, and had now “gained an insight into his offending” and the impact drugs offences have on people.

The lawyer commented on the of a lack of guns, cohesion and gangs which is usually associated with dealing drugs, and he also spoke of the “Achilles Heel” of the operation, which was leaving traces using websites such as Silk Road, which brought them to the attention of the authorities.

Eugene Grant QC, the barrister acting on behalf of Ryan Milligan, branded the case as “relatively novel ... involving modern and sophisticated operation”.

Saying his client was a “bright young man with IT skills”, he spoke of his client’s addictive personality which included problems with alcohol in his teens and a drugs problem in his early 20s.

Telling the court his client was from respectable family, Mr Grant said it “all came crashing down” for the father of one in August 2013. He also revealed that Milligan’s mother believed that prior to his arrest her son was going to die, but that he has now “cleaned up”.

Passing sentence, Judge McFarland said that he accepted both men became involved in the criminality due to their own drugs misuse. However, he branded their offending as a commercial drugs operation “with the potential to inflict serious damage to individuals and their communities, both here and further afield”.

The Judge also ordered that all the drugs seized be destroyed.