A 31-year-old man who pleaded guilty to trafficking ice with a street value of up to $26,000 was sentenced in the Supreme Court in Launceston to a nine-month drug treatment order.
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Joshua Brian Smith, of Mayfield, pleaded guilty in July to trafficking in methylamphetamine on December 4, 2018.
He also pleaded guilty to charges normally heard in the Launceston Magistrates Court including possession of a firearm and unlawful possession of stolen property including a motorbike and a chainsaw.
Smith was in the Supreme Court for trial on April 27 when a jury was empanelled and then adjourned.
However, Smith did not turn up on the next day causing the trial to be aborted.
He was arrested on May 24 and had been in custody since.
The court heard that Smith was living with his drug dealer Ebony Donnachy and supplying protection in exchange for drugs.
The arrests came after police raided a property in King Street, Mayfield, looking for a stolen motorcycle.
Ms Donnachy and three visitors including Scott Stewart and Aaron Greenwood were present.
Acting Justice Porter said Smith tried to hide a ziplock bag in his shorts.
The bag contained 26.4grams of ice of trafficable purity worth $13,200 to $26,000.
It was the state's case that he trafficked the ice by concealing it and hiding it in his shorts and that he believed that Mr Greenwood intended to sell it.
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After his arrest police found 0.1 grams of ice in his wallet in a search at the police station.
He said that Smith had momentary possession of a .303 bolt action rifle when handed to him by Scott Stewart who had five firearms.
Acting Justice Porter said Smith had a number of prior drug and offences and was sentenced to a wholly suspended six-week jail term in February 2018.
He was sentenced to the drug treatment order, an alternative sentence that enables offenders to avoid jail as long as they undergo drug treatment.
A suspended six-week jail sentence from 2018 was activated and backdated to the day of his arrest in May.
Acting Justice David Porter, who told an earlier hearing that he was not "overly enthusiastic" about a drug treatment order said Smith had some insight into his addiction.
The court heard that Smith is due for sentence in the Launceston Magistrates Court on August 19 on several counts of breach of bail, possession of a controlled drug and firearms charges.
Defence counsel Fran McCracken said the sentence foreshadowed by Magistrate Simon Brown was unlikely to result in imprisonment and would not breach the drug treatment order.
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Nick Clark
I am the Supreme and Magistrates Court reporter for the Examiner for the past 18 months. My journalism career has clicked over 30 years and encompasses four different spells at Tasmanian newspapers.
I am the Supreme and Magistrates Court reporter for the Examiner for the past 18 months. My journalism career has clicked over 30 years and encompasses four different spells at Tasmanian newspapers.
