Fifty grand to imprison young rascal, it's staggering (8)
I believe the answer is:
lurching
'staggering' is the definition.
('lurch' can be a synonym of 'stagger')
'fifty grand to imprison young rascal' is the wordplay.
'fifty' becomes 'l' (Roman numeral).
'grand' becomes 'g' (G is short for grand as in a thousand).
'to imprison' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'young rascal' becomes 'urchin' (I've seen this in another clue).
'l'+'g'='lg'
'lg' placed around 'urchin' is 'LURCHING'.
'it's' is the link.
(Other definitions for lurching that I've seen before include "Moving slowly and unsteadily" , "staggering unsteadily" .)