Washington Square Park drug kingpin and his ‘Yellow Bag boys’ ran wild Wall Street-worthy operation: insider

A drug kingpin raked in nearly $40,000 a month running a Wall Street-worthy operation near Washington Square Park — hiring worker bees for set shifts and twice the number of managers to oversee them, it was alleged in court Tuesday.

Justin Barry, an ex-drug con, testified in Manhattan federal court about the intricate inner workings of the open-air market allegedly operated by John Livigni — who he claimed was responsible for the famous Manhattan park’s notorious yearslong drug problem.

“I met him on West Eighth Street and Sixth Avenue,’’ Barry said of the accused prolific dealer, who allegedly peddled heroin, fentanyl and crack cocaine and is now charged in two drug-related deaths over a six-month span in 2025.

One of the people allegedly killed by Livigni’s drugs was an 18-year-old “rising star” Colorado transplant who had just arrived in the city to work in a Broadway-linked internship program.

“We sold drugs over there,” Barry said of the hip neighborhood, which was allegedly territory for Livigni, who he claimed headed up the “Yellow Bag Boys” — a nickname for the crew that dealt crack in yellow bags around the park.

Livigni’s trial kicked off as federal prosecutors branded him as the “leader” of a ring that dealt countless amounts of drugs for at least two decades.

“The defendant was a leader of a drug conspiracy that sold deadly illegal drugs around Washington Square Park,” Assistant United States Attorney Remy Grosbard said in her opening statements.

Barry, a recovering addict who first started working for Livigni in July 2023, brought jurors into the world of the alleged drug operation, explaining how to decipher what type of drugs were what based on their packaging — and explaining how lucrative the business was.

According to the witness, Livigni had two types of employees who operated around the park: “workers” and “managers.”

A worker made the hand-to-hand exchange of drugs to client, Barry said — adding that they worked anywhere from six to seven days a week, raking in up to $500 a day.

Livigni also had managers to oversee the worker during their shifts, although they were paid significantly less — about $800 a week — because they were “safe” from the dirty hands of the deals, according to Barry.

The drug kingpin had their schedule divided in three shifts to cover the morning, evening and overnight — which would be staffed with one worker and two managers per shift, Barry said.

Jurors were shown evidence bags containing several drugs seized when Barry was arrested while working for Livigni in 2025 — including color-coded baggies to identify each drug.

Several packages that were shown were yellow, which Barry said contained crack-cocaine. He estimated that they sold around five to six packs per shift, which tallied up to $1,800 in sales each week alone.

But the money maker — heroine and fentanyl, packed in light-blue envelopes — racked in up to $7,000 in sales per week, Barry said.

Barry, who pleaded out in a state drug case related to the trial, is one of several witnesses expected to testify against Livigni, who was indicted with 18 others in October 2025.

The drugs dealt by the crew, which also called itself WSP Enterprise, led to two deaths that year — including 18-year-old Bailey Shaw of Colorado.

Livigni is also charged in the death of a 43-year-old homeless person who’d been living in the park.

Prosecutors have said that the organized criminal group was estimated to have distributed millions of doses of opioids, including fentanyl and heroin, as well as crack cocaine, tied to at least 65 overdoses in the popular park since 2020.

Livigni faces up to life in prison if convicted of conspiracy to distribute narcotics resulting in death.

The trial will resume Wednesday.