SENTENCING STATEMENTS

Upon sentencing, Lord Arthurson made the following remarks:

"Richard Ordish and Kurtis Grant Young, on 15 May 2026 at a preliminary hearing at Glasgow High Court, each of you pled guilty to a composite charge comprising the crimes of wilful fire raising to the danger of the of life of two named persons and of their attempted murder, while on bail, the charge being aggravated by a connection with serious organised crime, namely the escalating feud between organised crime groups operating across the central belt, being the subject of Police Scotland’s Operation Portaledge.

"Your victims were neighbours in a residential street in south-east Edinburgh. You acquired two fuel containers, filled them with petrol and travelled by motorbike to the location of your crime. At around 1.00am on 4 April 2025, each of you, with your faces masked, was present at the scene. You Mr Ordish sat on the motorbike and you Mr Grant threw an ignited item through a ground floor window. You then fled on the motorbike. Footage of this event, later posted online by you Mr Ordish, was played in court on the date of your pleas of guilty being tendered. Five fire appliances were required to extinguish the fire, which caused very substantial damage to the two properties, running in total to hundreds of thousands of pounds. You undertook this crime on instructions for payment.

"You Mr Ordish are presently aged 19. You were 18 when you committed this offence. You have to date accrued four groups of previous convictions, one being a post offence conviction for possession of a knife along with dangerous driving in September 2025, for which crimes you received a sentence of detention.

"You Mr Young are presently aged 42. You were 40 when you committed this crime. You have to date accrued some 26 groups of previous convictions, four of these on indictment, the last one being a post offence conviction for assault to injury with intent to rob, using a knife. You have served 10 custodial sentences. In total you have three convictions related to the possession or use by you of knives.

"I have listened with care to the submissions advanced this morning in mitigation by your respective counsel, and note in particular what has been said regarding particular episodes arising in respect of your personal and family circumstances, and in your case Mr Young your positive employment history; your respective pathways into this offending; your acceptance of responsibility for your criminal conduct by way of your early guilty pleas, and in your case most significantly Mr Ordish the engagement of the young persons sentencing guideline.

"Turning now to the question of disposal, it is in my view plain from the gravity of the offending before the court this morning that only substantial custodial sentences are appropriate in respect of each of you. On the basis of the available risk assessment material, the nature of your offending in this case and your respective criminal histories, it is further clear that the normal period of licence would not be adequate to protect the public from serious harm from you when you are in due course released. I propose accordingly to impose upon both of you today an extended sentence. This sentence will be in two parts. The first part will be custodial. The second part will take the form of an extension period, when you will be under supervision while on licence in the community. The conditions of your licence will be fixed by Scottish Ministers. If you fail to comply with these licence conditions during the extension period your licence will be revoked and you may be returned to custody for a further period in respect of the present indictment. The court also has power to deal with you if you commit a further offence after your release from the custodial part of this sentence and while you are on licence and under supervision.

"This was a callous, concerted and targeted crime, perpetrated by you with your faces masked and in the context of an escalating organised crime gang war. It was carried out during hours of darkness in a residential street, while your putative victims and those living around them slept. It had the very real potential to kill and the scope of your criminal plan was, you have accepted by virtue of your guilty pleas encompassing the attempted murder of two people, a wholly murderous one. And you did all this for money and under instruction. It is difficult to express the contempt of the public for despicable criminal conduct of this nature. The court will simply not tolerate this level of criminality, and exemplary high tariff sentences are clearly called for in these circumstances.

"I now accordingly sentence you on charge four on this indictment as follows.

"Richard Ordish, you will serve an extended sentence of 11 years duration, with a custodial period of 7 years, reduced due to the timing and utility of your guilty plea from a headline custodial period of 9 years, and an extension period thereafter of 4 years. I attribute 1 year of the notional headline period to the serious organised crime aggravation and 6 months of that headline period to the libelled bail aggravation. Taking into account the interruption of your remand period in these proceedings by a separate custodial sentence, I confirm that the sentence imposed by the court today will be backdated to 4 June 2025. You are aged 19, and although you have served a custodial sentence before and have a criminal record you should understand that the undoubted and appropriate engagement of the young persons guideline in your case has saved you from a considerably higher custodial tariff.  

"Kurtis Grant Young, the young persons guideline of course does not apply to you. You are a seasoned criminal with a well-developed criminal history, notably of offending on indictment. This case, however, represents a significant escalation in the gravity of your offending behaviour to date. You appear to have been the principal perpetrator in this matter. You threw the petrol bomb into the house. In messages after the event you attributed to yourself a “leadership” role. You will serve an extended sentence of 15 years duration, comprising a custodial period of 11 years, reduced due to the timing and utility of your guilty plea from a headline custodial period of 14 years, and an extension period thereafter of 4 years. I attribute 18 months of that notional headline period to the serious organised crime aggravation and 6 months of that headline period to the libelled bail aggravations. Taking into account other custodial sentences which have been imposed on you during your remand period in these proceedings, I confirm that the sentence imposed by the court today will be backdated to 2 December 2025."

16 June 2026