Scot caged over £1.6m drug trafficking ring headed up extreme dog organisations
- Rory Cassidy
- May 26
- 3 min read
A crime boss jailed this week for importing huge amounts of drugs into Scotland in tins of dog food ran two extreme dog breeding organisations.
William Byrne, who was jailed for seven years and four months on Monday overba £1.6m drug ring, served as head of the American Bully Kennel Club (ABKC) UK.
The 41-year-old also runs American bully breeding business Dynamight Kennels and previously sold his dog's sperm for £15,000.
ABKC UK was exposed in a BBC documentary, which revealed that shows hosted by the body have included a parade of extremely bred dogs with illegally cropped ears.
Part of the 2023 BBC Disclosure programme included undercover footage from the body's (ABKC) UK show, with two 10-week-old pups with freshly cropped ears videoed at the home of ABKC judge Aaron Lee - a practice blasted as "appalling" by the RSPCA.
Byrne, who is originally from Wemyss Bay but used his drug dealing profits to buy a luxury home in Stirling, has made a fortune selling massive dogs as pups.
Some sell for as much as £5,000, with fans of the top-end bloodlines desperate to get their hands on what Byrne calls "demon pups".
And he even tried to sell his dog's semen for £15,000-a-time - so breeders could use it for a litter of pups.
He used the thousands he raked in from pup sales to splash out on a yellow Lamborghini, complete with private registration D333MON, in a nod to his love of dogs.
In one Instagram post he said: "I’ve decided I am going to sell two frozen breedings from the one and only Razorsedge demon boy!
"In my opinion one of the baddest dogs on the planet, the full package, rear, structure, drive, and pretty god damn close to the most perfect representation of the American bully.
"This is a chance to create something for the history books.
"He has been closed to the public for over 4 years and I feel it’s time to give some the opportunity to have this impeccable blood in their kennel breedings.
"Will be sold for £15k each paid in full no lock ins no pay ups semen will be sent to your nearest clinic as soon as paid."
Supercar driving Byrne and his associates smuggled drugs into Scotland from the Netherlands.
His partner in crime, John Neilson, was previously caged for seven and a half years for his role in the scheme, which took place during the coronavirus pandemic.
A "Nature's Best Dog Food" shipment was searched at Byrne’s RMB Services firm in Bathgate, West Lothian, following a raid by the National Crime Agency and Police Scotland.
They were acting on a tip-off and discovered 15kg of cocaine wrapped in black tape.
A later consignment unearthed a further 13kg, with the blocks valued at £40,000 each.
They had a purity of 65% pure, so were worth around £1.2m, and could have fetched around £1.625m when adulterated and sold in individual deals.
Byrne was arrested in Portugal in October 2025 and brought back to Scotland to be prosecuted.
Speaking after he was jailed on Monday at the High Court in Edinburgh, Alan O’Brien, Branch Commander for the NCA in Scotland, said: “William Byrne is a dangerous criminal, working internationally with the aim of flooding Scotland with lethal drugs.
“The NCA worked closely with our law enforcement colleagues overseas and Police Scotland to track Byrne down and return him to the UK to face justice for his crimes."
In 2011, he was ordered to hand over £45,000 under proceeds of crime laws, after he was jailed in 2010 for four-and-a-half-year over his £7million cocaine empire - which saw the drug baron and his gang caged for more than 63 years.
Byrne, who was 25 at the time, and his minions trafficked Caribbean cocaine and bought and sold drugs and guns across Scotland.
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