Jersey Unreported Judgments

Inferior Number Sentencing - removing criminal property from Jersey - acquiring and possession of criminal property.

[2016]JRC080

Royal Court

(Samedi)

8 April 2016

The Attorney General

-v-

Annie Cleaver

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

Age:  28.

Plea: Guilty.

Details of Offence:

The defendant, who lived in Liverpool, travelled to Jersey on three separate occasions in order to collect cash and deliver it to contacts in Liverpool.  The first two journeys were successfully completed, on the third she was arrested before she collected the cash. 

Count 11 relates to a trip on 18^th September, 2016.  The defendant travelled to Jersey accompanied by an associate.  She had been asked to accompany the associate to Jersey in order to collect cash, and had been told that the money was owed to an acquaintance of the associate.  The defendant did not know that the money represented the proceeds of drug trafficking, but suspected that it was connected to, or was the proceeds of, crime.  She thought it may have been stolen.  The following day, the defendant and the associate went to the address of one of the defendant's co-accused.  The defendant waited outside while the associate entered the flat and collected £5,800.  The associate and the defendant each took half of the money and travelled back to Liverpool together.  In return for undertaking this journey, the defendant received £180, and her flight back to Liverpool was paid for out of the funds collected. 

Count 12 relates to a trip on 1^st October, 2015.  The defendant travelled by plane from Liverpool to Jersey, this time alone.  The defendant knew she was to collect money, but once again was not told from where the money had come, nor did she ask.  She did, however, suspect that it was connected to, or the proceeds of, crime.  The defendant went again to the flat of one of her co-accused.  Once there, she received £4,000 from a co-accused at the front door.  The next day (2^nd October, 2015), the defendant returned to Liverpool with the money.  As payment, the defendant received £50 per £1,000 collected and a further £200, therefore making a total of £400. 

Count 13 relates to 8^th October, 2015, when the defendant flew to Jersey from Liverpool.  On this occasion she travelled with a friend.  The defendant came to Jersey with the intention of collecting cash and returning with it to Liverpool.  She was again suspicious of the provenance of the cash, but was motivated to undertake the journey by the promise of payment.  The defendant and her friend made their way to the address of a co-accused where plain clothes police officers were in the process of undertaking a search of the flat.  Not realising that he was a police officer, the defendant told Dc McGranahan that she was looking for 'Scobe' (a nickname of one of her co-accused) but could not provide a reason.  She and her friend were arrested and cautioned, and was told that one of her co-accused had been arrested with a quantity of heroin.  The defendant initially claimed that she was in the Island networking for her woven basket filling business but very soon afterwards admitted that she was at the flat to collect money, and that she had done so before. 

The defendant was initially vague in interview but was eventually completely cooperative. 

Details of Mitigation:

The Crown: Guilty plea, cooperative with the police, low risk of reoffending, mother to three young children. 

The Defence: time spent on remand not taken into account in Crown's conclusions, out of character, unaware that money related to drug trafficking. 

Previous Convictions:

One relevant previous conviction for production of cannabis. 

Conclusions:

The Crown was minded to move for a sentence of 12 months' imprisonment.  However, the defendant had served six months' on remand, the equivalent of a sentence of approximately nine months' imprisonment.  She has no connection to the Island, and is the mother of three young children.  It was submitted that little is to be gained by returning the defendant to prison for a matter of weeks.  Any non-custodial sentence could be served in Liverpool. 

The Crown sought a declaration of benefit in the sum of £882.99.

Total: 180 hours' Community Service Order together with a 12 month Probation Order.

Confiscation Order sought in the nominal amount of £1.

Sentence and Observations of Court:

Total: 180 hours' Community Service Order together with a 12 month Probation Order or 12 months' imprisonment in default.

Community Service Order to be completed in Liverpool.

Confiscation Order made in the nominal amount of £1.

E. L. Hollywood, Crown Advocate.

Advocate N. MacDonald for the Defendant.

JUDGMENT

THE BAILIFF:

1.        You are here to be sentenced on an Indictment which contains three counts of being involved in removing the proceeds of criminal activity from the Island.  The criminal activity in question was the cash derived from the sale of drugs from drug trafficking.  You will have heard what was said in Court earlier today.  Those who assist in the drug trafficking arrangements by taking cash are an important role in the drug trafficker's machinery.  People from the United Kingdom or anywhere else outside the Island would not be seeking to traffic drugs to our children if they could not get the money out of the Island afterwards and so when your counsel, understandably, and the Probation Service and others talk about the difficulties which you have in your family and your children, you must realise that our Island children also are at risk from drugs and it is from activities such as yours that that risk is increased.  These are serious offences.  There is no other way of putting it.  They are an important part of the island's protection against drug traffickers.  Just as the Courts have said on many occasions, you would not have thieves if you did not have receivers so you would not have drug traffickers if you did not have people who are prepared to help in the laundering of their proceeds of crime and that does emphasise why these are important offences. 

2.        In our case papers with us are some references to other cases and there have not been many on drug trafficking in terms of laundering of cash but, for example, we have been shown a case which was not drugs but fraud where US$40 million resulted in a 6 year sentence, where €80,000 for drugs resulted in an 18 month sentence, where £33,000 of drugs resulted in a 12 month sentence.  We want to make it plain that the sentence is not entirely related to the amount of money which is involved.  In your case, we have £10,000 worth of value.  That is not a small amount of money.  It is an amount of money that is directly related to the number of drug deals which have been trafficked in the island and assisted by what you have done.  We want to make that plain because if there are to be other cases in the Island, we do not regard there to be a tariff of money equals an amount of time in custody and indeed some members of this court might well be looking at a higher sentence of 12 months' imprisonment for activity such as this in the future. 

3.        We think that there is no doubt at all that you were conducting this business as a result of a catastrophic error of judgment.  We accept that.  We accept that there are numbers of mitigation points which you have as an individual and we are minded, in the light of everything that is contained in the probation report and on the basis of the papers we have seen generally, that it is an appropriate case in which we can show you some mercy.  But in doing so we want to make it absolutely plain that the sentence is related to the particular personal circumstances of your case and it does not form a precedent in any way at all. 

4.        I have made the comments I have about the sentence that we might have imposed in terms of custody because we do not accept what your counsel has said that the number of hours of community service ought to be reduced.  We do not think that is appropriate at all. 

5.        We have taken into account the effect on your family, the references you put before us, your early guilty plea, your cooperation with the police and the fact that the offences took place over a period of some three weeks.  Those things go in the balance for deciding how we find the right sentence to reflect your culpability. 

6.        We are going to grant the conclusions of the Crown.  But I want you to know, as you do, that we have had a considerable discussion about what is the right sentence to impose because these are very, very serious offences and you should have thought about our children and should have thought about your own children before you did what you did. 

7.        On Count 11 you are sentenced to 180 hours' Community Service and a 1 year Probation Order.  On Count 12 to 180 hours' community service and a 1 year Probation Order and on Count 13 to 180 hours' community service and a 1 year probation Order, all counts run concurrently, so it is a total of 180 hours' Community Service Order and a 1 year probation Order, which may be completed in Liverpool and the probation will be monitored by the Liverpool Probation Service.  If you do not perform the community service or if there is any difficulty with the Probation Order, you are liable to be brought before this Court and sentenced again for the offences which we are sentencing you for now and the 180 hours' community service represents 12 months' imprisonment which is what the sentence would have been today. 

Authorities

AG-v-Bhojwani [2010] JLR N 34.

AG-v-Bhojwani [2010] JRC 116.

AG-v-McFeat, Smyth & Howard [2013] (2) JLR N 11.

AG-v-McFeat [2013] JRC 137.

AG-v-Adam [2015] JRC 215.