STATE OF TASMANIA v BLAYNE ALEC KING 21 OCTOBER 2019
COMMENTS ON PASSING SENTENCE PEARCE J
Blayne King, you plead guilty to trafficking in a controlled substance. At about 4.00 am on 25 February 2019 the police were called to the Hobart airport when airline staff noticed that you and two other men with you were behaving erratically. One of the other men, Samuel Webb, tried to buy tickets to Melbourne using a large sum of cash. When the police arrived he was searched and they found $2,200 in cash and a snap lock bag in his underpants containing 19 orange tablets which he said was MDMA. Like your companions, you appeared affected by drugs. When you were searched you volunteered a snap lock bag containing five orange pills. You denied having anything else, but a freezer bag containing 224 orange and blue pills was in the pocket of your jeans. All of the pills, and some powder and broken pills found in your pocket, were later analysed and found to contain MDMA and MDA. There was a total of 49.6 grams. Analysis of your blood disclosed the presence of MDMA, MDA and methylamphetamine.
When you were interviewed you were evasive about how you go the pills and what you intended to do with them. The State now accepts that you had been given the larger bag of pills by one of your associates. The basis of the trafficking charge is that you guarded or concealed the pills in the belief that at least some of the pills were going to be sold by that man or someone else. If all had been sold at the going rate they would have returned somewhere between about $4,500 and $7,000, but you were not going to sell them and you only had them for a short period.
You were 23 when this crime was committed and you are now 24. You are overcoming some difficulties in your family and personal life, but your mother and grandmother are supportive of you. You do not currently have a job but you have the possibility of employment once your court matter is dealt with. You have no prior convictions under the Misuse of Drugs Act. In October 2017 you were fined for breaching bail and resisting and abusing police. In August this year you were given a wholly suspended one month sentence for two counts of assaulting police in March 2018. They are not prior convictions for sentencing purposes and you have not breached the suspended sentence, but it makes it worse for you that you must have been on bail for those offences when this crime was committed.
Samuel Webb pleaded guilty to trafficking. It was a more serious case because of other conduct that he was involved in. He was sentenced to imprisonment for 12 months wholly suspended for three years and a hundred hours of community service.
The courts and the community have made clear the seriousness with which trafficking in controlled drugs is to be treated. A sentence of imprisonment is required to mark the seriousness of your crime. However taking into account your relative youth, the absence of similar prior convictions, the quantity of the substance found in your possession and the nature of your participation in the trafficking I have decided to give you the opportunity to redeem yourself by wholly suspending the sentence. You should clearly understand that if you commit another offence during the period the suspended sentence remains in force it is very likely that the sentence that I am about to impose will be activated. As added punishment and to enable some supervision I will make a community correction order requiring you to perform community service.
Blayne King, you are convicted. I assess the expense of analysis of the drugs in the sum of $4,620 and award that sum against you as part of the costs of the prosecutor. You have 28 days to pay that sum. If you require longer you may apply to enter into a repayment arrangement. On the indictment you are convicted and sentenced to imprisonment for three months, wholly suspended for 18 months from today. It is a condition of that order that while it is in force you do not commit any offence punishable by imprisonment. If you breach that condition then a court must order that you serve that term unless it is unjust. In addition, I make a community corrections order for a period of 12 months from today. The core conditions of that order will be specified in the order you will be given and include that you not commit an offence punishable by imprisonment, that you report to and comply with the directions of a probation officer, that you must not leave Tasmania without permission and that you must notify of any change of address. I impose a special condition that you must, within the operational period of the order satisfactorily perform 49 hours of community service, as directed by a probation officer or a supervisor. If you breach any of those conditions you may be brought back to court and re-sentenced.