A man caught trying to smuggle more than $5 million worth of drugs into Tasmania will stay eligible for parole after the Supreme Court rejected a push for a tougher sentence.
In a judgment published last week, Tasmania’s Court of Criminal Appeal dismissed an appeal by the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) against the sentence handed to 27-year-old Oneck Walter Francis.
Francis was arrested in November 2023 when police and drug detection dogs intercepted his rental car as it came off the Spirit of Tasmania ferry.
Inside, they found more than six kilograms of methylamphetamine and cocaine.
“Altogether there were six cryovacced packages … in total there was 6,084.36 grams of methylamphetamine and cocaine respectively. More than two hundred and forty three times the trafficable quantity,” the judgment said.
Francis, a former Guilford Young College student, pleaded guilty to one count of trafficking in a controlled substance. He was sentenced to two years and three months in prison, with a non-parole period of 18 months.
The DPP argued that the sentence was “manifestly inadequate” given the seriousness of the offence and the drugs’ estimated street value of between $2.6 million and $5 million.
But the three-judge panel unanimously rejected the appeal, saying the sentence was fair when considering Francis’s role as a low-level courier and his personal situation.
The court heard Francis took the job while under serious financial stress, noting he was $20,000 in debt and supporting family in Africa.
Francis, who arrived in Australia as a teenage refugee and later became a citizen, told police he was expecting to be paid $5,000 once the drugs were delivered.
The panel acknowledged that drug trafficking usually brings heavy penalties but said each case needs to be judged on its own facts.
The court noted Francis had no prior convictions for drug offending, was not a drug user himself and suffered from depression and mental health issues exacerbated by his financial difficulties.
With the appeal knocked back, Francis remains eligible to apply for parole.
