Jersey Unreported Judgments

[2008]JRC121

ROYAL COURT

(Samedi Division)

1^st August 2008

The Attorney General

-v-

Mark St. John Marsh

Sentencing by the Inferior Number of the Royal Court, following guilty pleas to the following charges:

First Indictment

Second Indictment

Age:  42.

Plea: Guilty.

Details of Offence:

Personal use of cannabis in order to alleviate symptoms of serious back injury.  Supply was social and limited in nature.  Aggravating feature was supply to his own son.

Details of Mitigation:

Good Character.  Cooperated with Police from outset.  Delay in bringing charges - 8 months.

Previous Convictions:

None.

Conclusions:

First Indictment

Second Indictment

Total: 6 months' imprisonment or 180 hours' Community service Order, as the Court sees fit.

Confiscation Order in the sum of £2,300 sought.

Forfeiture and destruction of the drugs sought.

Sentence and Observations of Court:

First Indictment

Second Indictment

Total: 180 hours' Community Service Order.

Exceptional circumstances including delay.

Confiscation Order in the sum of £2,300 made, 3 months' imprisonment in default.  1 month to pay.

Forfeiture and destruction of the drugs ordered.

H. Sharp, Esq., Crown Advocate.

Advocate C. Nicolle for the Defendant.

JUDGMENT

THE DEPUTY BAILIFF:

1.        Mr Marsh, you are a man of 42, with no previous convictions yet you have pleaded guilty to offences involving the supply of cannabis.  We accept that you suffered serious injuries in a road traffic accident in 2001 and that your recovery has been long and slow.  You have clearly been in a great deal of pain and you became dependant on painkillers at one stage.  You then found that cannabis alleviated the pain having been advised of this by a so-called friend, and you began using it.  Foolishly, you became involved in supplying, but the Crown has accepted that this was on a very limited basis.  You supplied 1 ounce to your son, who is seventeen, you supplied 5 ounces to acquaintances over the year before your arrest for a total of some £750, and you also facilitated by way of introduction a  supply of 3 nine bars during the course of 2006 for which you received £150.  You were also found in possession of cannabis when the police came to your flat in August.  In total, adding all these up together, we are dealing with about a kilo.

2.        An aggravating feature is that you supplied to your own son.  You say you did it to monitor your son's use and to protect him from dealers.  We have to say this was extremely naive and you behaved very irresponsibly towards your son; supplying him with cannabis was simply likely to increase his use of that drug.

3.        Advocate Nicolle has put forward powerful mitigation on your behalf.  You have, of course, your guilty plea from the start and you wrote your own indictment on a number of counts.  You clearly have an exemplary character and we have read the references.  You are now back at work and are putting your life together.  We also take into account the limited nature of the dealing in this case and there is a strong recommendation from all three of the reports that there should be a non-custodial sentence.  The background report says you are highly unlikely to re-offend and the psychological report says that you would be highly likely to suffer detrimental psychological impact if we were to send you to prison.

4.        However, drug dealing is dealt with severely by this Court.  There is an additional factor in this case and that is one of delay.  It is of note that, although you were found in possession of this cannabis in August of last year and you made immediate admissions, you were not charged until the 28^th February, 2008.  As a result, this has been hanging over you for a year.  We think that is far too long for a matter of this nature where you have pleaded guilty from the outset, and we have taken this into account. 

5.        We are persuaded that this is an exceptional case and, although almost invariably a prison sentence is imposed for dealing in class B drugs, we accept that we can on this occasion proceed by way of a non-custodial sentence.  We are going to impose a sentence of 40 hours' Community Service on Count 1 and 180 hours' Community Service on Counts 2 to 5, all of those concurrent, so that is 180 hours' Community Service altogether.  As to the prison sentence which we would have had in mind, we have to say, that whilst we can understand why the Crown moves for such a low custodial sentence, from the starting point of 2 years we think the correct sentence would have been 12 months.  It follows that if you do not perform the Community Service, if you do not turn up when you are directed to or if you re-offend during the period of Community Service you will be brought back and then the Court will be highly likely to impose the prison sentence we have just described, namely one of 12 months. 

6.        We order the forfeiture and the destruction of the drugs.  We allow one month to pay for the confiscation order.

No Authorities