New South Wales District Court CITATION: R v Jeremy CHETTY [2009] NSWDC 214 HEARING DATE(S): 19 June 2009 JUDGMENT DATE: 19 June 2009 JURISDICTION: Criminal JUDGMENT OF: Berman SC DCJ DECISION: For the offence of supplying GHB, taking into account the matter on the Form One, the offender is sentenced to imprisonment. I set a non-parole period of nine months and a head sentence of eighteen months. For the offence of supplying methylamphetamine, the offender is sentenced to imprisonment. I set a fixed term of six months. That is a fixed term because it is a sentence on the first matter I have just announced. CATCHWORDS: Criminal law - Sentence - Supply prohibited drug - Gamma butryolactone - Methylamphetamine - Appropriate medical care in custody LEGISLATION CITED: Drug Misuse and Trafficking Act 1985 PARTIES: The Crown Jeremy Chetty FILE NUMBER(S): DC 2009/22/0243 COUNSEL: B Longville - Offender SOLICITORS: NSW DPP Armstrong Legal SENTENCE 1 HIS HONOUR: Jeremy Chetty appears for sentence today after having pleaded guilty at the earliest opportunity to two offences. The first was an offence of supplying a prohibited drug relating to the drug GHB. The second was also an offence of supplying a prohibited drug, this time relating to a quantity of methylamphetamine. When I sentence him for the first of those matters, he asks that I take into account a further offence on a Form One, namely an offence of dealing with the proceeds of crime. 2 The offences are of course very serious. The quantity of GHB involved was significant; indeed approximately half the commercial quantity. The seriousness of various types of drug is a matter that Parliament has determined when it has set out the various quantities of drugs in the schedule to the Drug Misuse and Trafficking Act. 3 The offender must receive a sentence of full-time custody. His counsel very properly did not suggest otherwise. As I will demonstrate in a moment, the offender was trafficking to a substantial degree and there are no exceptional circumstances which would justify anything other than full-time custody. 4 The offender began taking drugs as he reached the end of his teenage years. As is inevitably the case, his drug use escalated. He moved out of home and got involved in the drug culture associated with gay nightclubs. He commenced by taking ecstasy but it was not long before he moved on to amphetamines and GHB. He described the effect that GHB had upon him in the witness box. It was an effect which he sought and so continued to use that drug, as it gave him confidence. 5 Of course he was not working. He had been, but he was not at the time he was a drug user, and in order to fund his lifestyle, he had to commence supplying the drug. He was supplying for the purpose of funding his own drug use, as is almost inevitably the case. 6 Police went to the location where the offender was staying in a hotel. He and others he was with had rented two rooms there. At the time police went to the hotel the offender was not present. He was out purchasing more GHB. They found within the room some drugs, some currency and a large quantity of drug supply paraphernalia. 7 In particular they found a tackle box and a set of drawers of the type found in home workshops usually filled with nuts and bolts. In the offender's case they were filled with plastic bags, smaller envelopes, plastic soy sauce containers in the shape of a fish, (the standard way that GHB is distributed) and other paraphernalia including scales. It is clear that this was a fairly extensive drug supply operation. That much is obvious not only from the drug paraphernalia that I have described, but the two lists of names and amounts also discovered by police. 8 The offender said of the quantity of drug police found, that some was going to be used by him and his friends and the rest was going to be sold in order, to supply the offender with more money which he could then spend on more drugs. 9 The offender whose family are from Fiji, had an unhappy time at school. He was teased and bullied because of the colour of his skin and not surprisingly he took such teasing and bullying very much to heart. He has had a sad life in many respects and now has low self esteem. He has been sexually assaulted on two occasions in his life; something that he has not told anyone. Certainly as he said in evidence today, his father is only learning about that today. He has suffered from depression for many years and a psychologist says that he has thoughts of self loathing. 10 His family were Jehovah's Witnesses. His drug use of course involved an abandonment of that religion. However of recent times, in fact after having been arrested for these matters, the offender has attempted to rehabilitate himself and has achieved a significant measure of rehabilitation. He has entered into residential rehabilitation programs and it says that he has not used drugs for some time. Urinalysis has detected cannabis use, but nothing of more seriousness. 11 The offender was employed before starting his drug use and so there is hope for the future. Indeed there are good prospects of rehabilitation. He now lives back at home, wants to re-enter the church lifestyle and has the support of not only his family, but also good friends, having abandoned his association with the wrong crowd after his arrest for these matters. He has expressed his remorse in evidence today. I am satisfied that that expression of remorse is genuine. 12 The offender does not have a clean criminal history, but his previous offending was for drug use and is clearly related to the circumstances which bring him before court today. 13 It is important to emphasise that the offender has suffered from asthma for a great deal of his life and has been admitted to hospital on a number of occasions, most recently, about a month ago. A report from a doctor tendered to me today says that the offender will tolerate incarceration very poorly from a medical point of view. It is for that reason that it is my strong recommendation that the offender's health, both physical and mental, be closely monitored whilst he is in custody. The offender must be punished for what he has done, but it is no part of that punishment that he is denied appropriate medical care. 14 There are clearly special circumstances in this case. The offender is still relatively young and will be serving his sentence as his first time in custody and it is also important that the good work that the offender has achieved by way of rehabilitation is continued. 15 As I began these remarks, it is necessary that the offender received a sentence of full-time custody. Nothing less would reflect the gravity of the offender's conduct. He has spent one day in custody and so the sentence I will impose will commence yesterday. 16 For the offence of supplying GHB, taking into account the matter on the Form One, the offender is sentenced to imprisonment. I set a non-parole period of nine months and a head sentence of eighteen months. That sentence commenced yesterday on 18 June 2009 and so the non-parole period will expire on 17 March 2010 on which day the offender is to be released to parole. For the offence of supplying methylamphetamine, the offender is sentenced to imprisonment. I set a fixed term of six months. That is a fixed term because it is a sentence on the first matter I have just announced. ********** DISCLAIMER - Every effort has been made to comply with suppression orders or statutory provisions prohibiting publication that may apply to this judgment or decision. The onus remains on any person using material in the judgment or decision to ensure that the intended use of that material does not breach any such order or provision. Further enquiries may be directed to the Registry of the Court or Tribunal in which it was generated.