Jersey Unreported Judgments

Inferior Number Sentencing - drugs - supply - Class B

[2022]JRC193

Royal Court

(Samedi)

15 September 2022

The Attorney General

-v-

David Vallois

Sentencing by the Inferior Number of the Royal Court, following a guilty plea to the following charge:

Age:  47. 

Plea: Guilty. 

Details of Offence:

As part of a connected investigation the police executed a search warrant at Christopher Cornick's address in St Helier.  Mr Cornick's phone was seized, and messages were downloaded.  Those messages related to drug dealing and showed Mr Cornick supplying cannabis to various people.  On Mr Cornick's phone a contact called 'Big D' was identified as Mr Cornick's upstream supplier and the telephone number has been identified as the Defendant's.

The Defendant was arrested and his phone was seized.  Messages between Mr Cornick and the Defendant were downloaded from his phone including messages after Mr Cornick's arrest with the Defendant asking for some written proof that Mr Cornick had been arrested.

The Defendant was determined by a drug expert to have been involved at the highest wholesale supply level locally or involved in the importation of herbal cannabis into the jurisdiction and onward distribution and had supplied Mr Cornick with at least two kilograms of herbal cannabis in the preceding year prior to Mr Cornick's arrest.

Details of Mitigation:

Guilty plea, but Defendant not entitled to full credit for plea given the inevitability of the conviction and the timing of the guilty plea.

Previous Convictions:

Previous conviction for importing controlled drugs in 2001 in relation to 24 kilos of cannabis resin and has French convictions relating to the importation of drugs in 2004.

Conclusions:

Declaration of benefit sought in the sum of £30,842.

A nominal confiscation order sought in the sum of £1.

Forfeiture and destruction of Defendant's phone sought.

Sentence and Observations of Court:

Declaration of benefit made in the sum of £30,842.

A nominal confiscation order made in the sum of £1.

Forfeiture and Destruction of Defendant's phone ordered.

S. Crowder Esq., Crown Advocate.

Advocate O. A. Blakeley for the Defendant.

JUDGMENT

THE DEPUTY BAILIFF:

1.        David Vallois you are 47 years old and have pleaded guilty, although not at the first opportunity, to an offence of being concerned in the supply of cannabis.  You fall to be sentenced, as the Crown has correctly described, as a commercial dealer in substantial quantities of cannabis at the highest wholesale supply level in Jersey.

2.        You were arrested as a consequence of your identification as the supplier of another offender who stored you as 'Big D' in his mobile telephone.  Messages between the two of you showed that you supplied at least 2kg of herbal cannabis to that man, who has now been sentenced himself, in the year prior to July of 2021.  The messages showed that you were supplying large quantities of cannabis for substantial amounts, for example one supply of cannabis resulted in a payment to you of £6,600 in October 2020.  A further supply resulted in a debt to you of £4,200 which you were to be paid in cash through a car window in December 2020; in January 2021 you were paid £20 per gram for 375 grams totally £7,000 and you offered to supply an additional 250 grams at the same time.  These are examples of the extent to which you were supplying substantial amounts of cannabis for cash.

3.        When you were arrested by the police you gave no assistance in interview, making "no comment", and when you first appeared before the Magistrate early this year you entered not guilty pleas.  You will not receive full credit for you plea as you failed to enter guilty pleas at the earliest opportunity.  You are familiar with the courts and you received a 5 year sentence in this Court in 2001 for importing a substantial amount of cannabis and a 4 year sentence from the French courts in 2004 for importation of drugs.

4.        There is, in our view, little mitigation available to you beyond your guilty plea although we have read the Pre-Sentence Report with care and note the innocent victims in this case of this offending including your wife and children and the fact you are disappointed that you have let them down after an eight year spell without offending.

5.        You must have gone into this offending with your eyes wide open and to import and sell substantial quantities of drugs on a commercial basis against the background of your offending history is so serious that only a custodial sentence can be justified. 

6.        We agree with the Crown's assessment with which your advocate concurred, that the starting point is 2 years and 6 months' imprisonment.  You are not entitled to the full one third customary law discount usually given in view of the circumstances of the case including your failure to enter a guilty plea at the first opportunity, but we do give you greater credit than that allowed for by the Crown.

7.        The sentence we impose is one of 22 months' imprisonment.

8.        We order forfeiture and destruction of your mobile phone.

9.        We have made the confiscation order sought by the Crown.

Authorities

Campbell v AG [1995] JLR 136. 

Rimmer v AG [2001] JLR 373. 

AG v Cornick [2022] JRC 079. 

AG v Ferguson, Morgan and Saunders [2022] JRC 102. 

AG v Goncalves [2022] JRC 097.