Director of Public Prosecutions v Nguyen
[2019] VCC 108
•13 February 2019
| IN THE COUNTY COURT OF VICTORIA AT MELBOURNE CRIMINAL DIVISION | Revised Not Restricted Suitable for Publication |
Case No. CR-18-00107
| DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS |
| v |
| THAI NGOC NGUYEN |
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JUDGE: | HER HONOUR JUDGE HOGAN | |
WHERE HELD: | Melbourne | |
| DATE OF HEARING | 26 to 29 November 2018 and 3 and 4 December 2018 | |
DATE OF PLEA HEARING: | 29 January 2019 | |
DATE OF SENTENCE: | 13 February 2019 | |
CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | DPP v Nguyen | |
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2019] VCC | |
REASONS FOR SENTENCE
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Subject:
Catchwords: Attempted possession of an unlawfully imported border-controlled drug in a commercial quantity (22.277 kg methamphetamine) – convicted following trial – total effective sentence 10 years with non-parole period 6 years 10 months
Legislation Cited:
Cases Cited:
Sentence:
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APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the DPP | Ms K Breckweg | The Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions |
| For the Accused | Mr R van de Weil SC | Theo Magazis & Associates |
HER HONOUR:
1 Thai Ngoc Nguyen, following a trial a jury has found you guilty of one charge of attempting to possess a commercial quantity of an unlawfully imported border-controlled drug. This offence carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.
2 The circumstances surrounding the commission of the offence were as follows. On 21 April 2017, an unidentified person had attended Reservoir East Licensed Post Office and registered for an Australia Post “MyPost” card on two occasions. Each card had a different account number but the same name, Jacky Tran, and date of birth and telephone number and address, namely 16 Nutwood Street, Reservoir, Victoria. A slightly different email address was supplied with each card. It is not disputed that you and your wife are joint owners of the property at 16 Nutwood Street, Reservoir, which was an investment property.
3 On 14 June 2017, Australian Border Force intercepted two air cargo consignments from the United States addressed to Jacky Tran at the Nutwood Street address. The contact number for Jacky Tran was a mobile number ending in 398 (“the consignment phone”). The contents of the consignment were listed as being drive shafts. Upon investigation by law enforcement authorities, each of the two boxes in the consignment was found to contain two black metal drive shafts. Concealed inside each drive shaft was methamphetamine which, on analysis, was found in total to weigh 22.277 kilograms of pure methamphetamine.
4 On 19 June 2017, a federal agent contacted the consignment phone. You answered that phone and identified yourself as Jacky Tran. Arrangements were made for the delivery of the consignment to the Nutwood Street address between 9.00am and 12 midday the following day. At approximately 9.25am on 20 June 2017, a federal agent purporting to be a courier (who, in fact, did not have any consignment to deliver, as there had not been time to remove the methamphetamine and reconstitute the consignment) attended the Nutwood Street address. He observed you arrive and then approached you, asking if you were Jacky, and you stated: “Yeah. Is that it – what is it?” The federal agent stated he had a consignment and you stated: “Okay, cool” and you both walked over to the courier van to unload the consignment. You were then arrested. At the time of your arrest, you were in possession of keys to the front and back door of the Nutwood Street premises.
5 A search of the vehicle driven by you detected the consignment phone on the front passenger seat of the vehicle and it was plugged into a charger on the console. Another mobile phone ending “889”, which you admitted was your own personal mobile phone, was also located on the front passenger seat. One of the previously mentioned “MyPost” cards in the name of Jacky Tran with the Nutwood Street address on it was located in the front driver’s side door well.
6 You were interviewed by police. You stated that you had gone to the Nutwood Street address to do maintenance work. You also stated that, at an earlier time, you had found the MyPost card in the letterbox along with other unclaimed mail from former tenants. You had returned the unclaimed mail to the senders but stated that the MyPost card must have slipped out of the bundle of mail and remained in the vehicle.
7 The consignment phone was registered in the name of Miss Lijuan Hao of 14 Derna Crescent, Lalor, Victoria, which was a false registration. Examination of the consignment phone showed that, on the day prior to delivery, namely, 19 June 2017 at approximately 6.09pm, a Western Australian-based telemarketing company had telephoned the consignment phone number. The call was unanswered. About 14 minutes later, your own personal mobile telephone number ending in 889 called the same telemarketing service.
8 In the trial run before the jury, you did not dispute that you had been prepared to accept the consignment to 16 Nutwood Street, but disputed that you intended or meant to try to possess the consignment and also disputed that you either knew or believed or were reckless as to whether the consignment contained a border-controlled drug.
9 You gave sworn evidence that you had known Jacky Tran for approximately two years and saw him weekly in order to “hang out”. You maintained that the day prior to being arrested at the Nutwood Street address, you had had lunch with Jacky Tran and he asked you to do him a favour by picking up the delivery for him at Nutwood Street and he stated that, as you may need some form of identification, he gave you a MyPost card. You stated that, as the two of you were on the way home from lunch, Jacky Tran asked if he could put the consignment phone on the charger and he had forgotten it when he exited from the vehicle. You stated that he later called you and stated that he was expecting a call from the people who were delivering the consignment and asked if you would pick up the phone for him. You agreed that, when the federal agent had rung the consignment phone masquerading as a courier driver, you had answered the phone and told him that you were Jacky Tran. You stated that, when the telemarketing company phoned the consignment phone, you were unable to answer it as you did not have Jacky Tran’s PIN for the phone so, out of politeness, you used your own phone to return the call to the telemarketer.
10 In your sworn evidence, you stated that you did not know what was being delivered to the Nutwood Street address. Jacky Tran had told you that it was something to do with the house, so you assumed it was furniture and you had no reason to believe that there were drugs in it and were shocked when you were arrested.
11 Under cross-examination, you agreed that you had told a number of lies when interviewed by police on 20 June 2017. You agreed that you did not tell police in your record of interview that you knew Jacky Tran or you were there to collect a package for him. You claimed that you had tried to tell police this before the interview had started, but they did not believe you so you tried to distance yourself from Jacky Tran. You also agreed that you had lied when you told police in the record of interview that you had found the MyPost card in the mail box and that you had also lied when you told police in the record of interview that you had never used the name Jacky Tran.
12 When asked in cross-examination why the MyPost card had Jacky Tran’s name with your address on it, you told the jury that, in about April 2017, you had arranged with Jacky Tran to move into that address. You had been supposed to fix the place up, but had not done so because your father had been terminally ill with cancer. You told the jury that you were not frank with the police because you were scared and confused. You agreed that your explanation in the record of interview as to how you had come by the MyPost card was quite a detailed story and you stated that, after being arrested and prior to being interviewed, you had had at least two or three hours to think about it.
13 The jury obviously did not accept your explanations given on oath. I must say that I found much of what you had to say to be unconvincing. For example, you were unable to explain how it was that Jacky Tran had asked you at lunch on 19 June 2017 to accept the delivery on 20 June, when it had not been until subsequently, namely about 4.30pm on 19 June 2017, that you had taken the call from the federal agent posing as a delivery driver and made arrangements for the delivery on the 20th. Nor did it make much sense that, in April of 2017, you had made arrangements for Jacky Tran to move into the Nutwood Street address, given that you had told police in your record of interview that previous tenants had destroyed it and that it was necessary for you to undertake maintenance at the house to see what walls needed to be put up and what measurements needed to be taken in the kitchen and to clear out a lot of rubbish.[1] Given that Jacky Tran was not living at the Nutwood Street address, which was uninhabitable, there was no obvious reason as to why a consignment should be addressed to him there, rather than at his own address. Your explanation that you called back the telemarketer who had rung the consignment phone by using your own phone was also not convincing in that you told the jury that you did this is “out of politeness” and, also, that Jacky Tran had asked you to answer his phone, yet, he had not given you the PIN number for it. Your explanation contrasted with your record of interview, in which you told police that you were unable to explain why you had called the telemarketing company back on your phone after the consignment phone had received the call from it.[2]
[1]Record of Interview – Answers to Questions 78, 99 and 100
[2]Record of Interview – Answer to Questions 372 – 376
14 In a plea on your behalf by Mr van de Weil of Senior Counsel, the Court was told that you are presently aged 37 years, having been born on 10 March 1981. You come before the Court with a limited criminal history. On 25 May 1999 at Heidelberg Magistrates’ Court, you appeared on two charges: one of making a false document and one of using a false document. Without conviction, you were fined an aggregate of $250. In the Melbourne County Court on 14 December 2005, you appeared on one charge of trafficking in cannabis. Without conviction, you were fined $2,500 and were released on an adjourned bond for a period of 12 months.
15 Mr van de Weil told the Court your parents were born in Vietnam and, in 1981, they fled to a refugee camp in Thailand, where you were born. Six months after you were born, your family came to Australia as refugees. You are one of five children. You have one older brother and three sisters. You were described as a close-knit Catholic family and your counsel stated that, at the time of offending, you were living at your parents’ home in Doncaster with your wife, whom you married eight years ago, and your two younger sisters. It would appear that your family is a decent, hardworking and law abiding family. They were present in Court to support you throughout the trial and, also, at the plea hearing.
16 In spite of being a good student who completed Year 12 and then commenced a Bachelor of Building and Construction at Melbourne University before changing to complete a Bachelor of Commerce at Deakin University, you have a history of substance abuse dating from approximately 15 years of age. It began with you smoking cannabis and drinking alcohol. By 18 years of age, you were using other drugs and over the last two decades, at times, you have smoked 2 or 3 grams of ice daily and stayed awake for up to seven days without any significant sleep. To “come down” off ice, you would often smoke cannabis or use benzodiazepines.[3]
[3] Exhibit 3, Report of Mr Ian Mackinnon, Psychologist, dated 21 January 2019, p3–4
17 In spite of your drug abuse, you appear to have a reasonably good work history. You worked as a financial planner for about nine years and, later, established a furniture importing business in partnership with a friend for about seven years. You had purchased an investment property at the Nutwood Street address which you had rented out by way of individual rooms for a period of time.
18 Unfortunately, it would appear that from 2013 you were engaged in gambling at Crown Casino. Tendered as Exhibit “4” was a statement from Michelle Louise Fielding, Group General Manager at Crown Casino, which noted that in a period of three or four years from 2013, you had lost a total of $490,570 at Crown Casino while playing games at tables or on gaming machines. The statement and annexure did not provide any information about any gaming activity after 28 August 2016, although the prosecution acknowledged that you had travelled overseas in 2016 for purposes relating to your furniture business and, also, to attend a family funeral in Canada. Following the conclusion of the plea hearing a further document from Crown Casino was tendered as part of Exhibit 4. This stated that there was no record of you having gambled at Crown Casino in 2017.
19 You have continued to protest your innocence in relation to the charge of which the jury has found you guilty, claiming that you were simply doing a favour for Jacky Tran and had no knowledge that there were drugs in the consignment from the United States and never intended to attempt to take possession of any drugs.
20 Your brother-in-law, Dr David Hai Tran, who is the Medical Director of Paediatrics at the Royal Children’s Hospital and Northern Hospital, gave evidence at your plea hearing. He stated that in or about 2005 or 2006, prior to your marriage to your wife, Rachana, you were involved in a car accident and suffered an acquired brain injury. Although you had made quite a good recovery, you do have some residual difficulties in that you are forgetful and not as sharp as previously. I here note that, in the psychological report tendered from Mr Ian Mackinnon, he described these as “minor cognitive deficits” affecting your concentration and focus. It is apparent that you recovered sufficiently to successfully work as a financial planner and, subsequently, as a furniture importer.
21 Dr Tran confirmed that you are part of a close and religious family. He stated that it had taken him some time to realise that you were a gambler. He knew that you were in financial difficulty and, over a period of some six months in 2013 or 2014, he progressively advanced you $100,000 by way of a loan, which you have never repaid. In addition, your mother had advanced you a loan of $40,000, which he believes you have never repaid. He stated that you did not voluntarily disclose to the family that you were gambling. Dr Tran stated that, in 2013, your parents decided to undertake building works with a view to opening a restaurant in Richmond. The family lost money because of the actions of the builder who was engaged to carry out the project. He stated that, by 2016, you had ceased operating your importing business in order to help establish and operate the restaurant. Along with your father, you were the manager, whilst your mother was the chef, and other family members helped out in the business. After the building works were completed in 2013, Dr Tran stated that the business became viable. However, he was unaware that you were a drug user. He stated that you had worked full time in the restaurant for wages.
22 He stated that, during 2016, your father became unwell with cancer and was given a 12 month prognosis and he ultimately died in March 2018. As your father became progressively more unwell, you were relied upon increasingly to manage the restaurant. When you were arrested and remanded in custody on 20 June 2017, things became increasingly difficult for the family as your father’s health was failing and no one else in the family had the skills to manage the business and there were ongoing issues with getting regular and appropriately trained staff. Your mother’s English is poor and it was challenging for her to try to communicate effectively with staff and customers.
23 In January 2018, you were granted bail on the basis of a $750,000 surety provided by your parents, with conditions that you report daily to police, reside with your parents and be subject to a curfew between the hours of 9.00pm and 6.00am. Bail was granted upon the basis that the family was suffering because of the difficulty in running the restaurant with your father’s failing health. Tendered as Exhibit “1” was a document from Mr Hue Thi Nguyen, the tax agent for the family restaurant. He provided various monthly gross sales which have fluctuated over 2018. He stated that the sales figures increased steadily during 2018 with your help in replacing your father as restaurant manager. You were remanded in custody following the jury verdict on 4 December 2018. The tax agent stated that, since your absence from the family business from November (presumably when you were running your trial) until the present time, there had been a decline in sales figures and that your mother has struggled to understand the day to day operations of the business and, if this situation continues, the business will suffer financially.
24 At my request, subsequent to the conclusion of the plea hearing, a document concerning the gross monthly takings of the restaurant in previous years was provided by the tax agent. This has been added to form part of Exhibit “1”. These records commence on 15 December 2012 and conclude in December 2018. The records demonstrate a gradual improvement in gross sales during 2013 and, generally speaking, further increases in sales, but with fluctuations, over subsequent years. From the records, I am not able to discern a consistent notable increase in sales from your involvement in the restaurant in 2016. The periods from January to May and July to September 2016 had less gross sales than the previous year. There were slight increases of a few hundred dollars in June and October and some $2,400 in December. However the increases were not maintained in the first half of 2017 prior to your being remanded in custody in June 2017. All months for the first 6 months of 2017 had less gross sales than in 2016, with the exception of February which had an increase of approximately $1,700 compared to the previous year. In fact, after you were remanded in custody, the gross sales each month increased for the period from July to December 2017.
25 You were granted bail and released from custody on 17 January 2018. Gross sales were higher for January, February and March 2018 compared with 2017, but lower for the months of April to July 2018. There were increases for August, September and October and still increases, albeit not quite as marked, for November and December 2018. However, I note from the 2017 records that the sales for November and December were also down compared with July to October.
26 I accept that 2018 was a difficult year for your family following the death of your father on 6 March 2018 and, prior to that, you and your mother alternated in caring for him. However, I cannot be satisfied that the records bear out the tax agent’s statement that your presence as manager resulted in the sales figures increasing steadily. Nor can I be satisfied that any decline in monthly takings since you were remanded in custody in November 2018 is necessarily due to your absence. Although I do accept that it would have been of assistance to the family business to have you there.
27 Your counsel stated that your mother who is the chief cook at the restaurant suffers diabetes, elevated blood pressure and depression and this should be taken into account by the Court in determining that exceptional circumstances exist. Dr Tran had given evidence about these matters and mentioned that, over recent years, apart from the death of her husband, your mother also lost her mother, as well as her sister, who died of cancer. He stated that your mother is 60 years old and takes “a lot of medication”. She has poor English and cannot manage staff. Dr Tran stated that the restaurant has struggled, particularly last year.
28 Although one could not help but have compassion for your mother, and I accept that you will worry about her and she will worry about you, there was no actual medical evidence tendered to the Court about her medical condition, and it would appear that she has continued to be able to perform the role of chief cook at the restaurant. The sales figures produced as Exhibit 1, while demonstrating some fluctuations, do not show that the restaurant has been “struggling” compared with the sales in 2017 or 2016.
29 In my view, the evidence put before the Court in relation to the family restaurant falls short of meeting the high test of exceptional hardship. Although your older brother apparently lacks the capacity to manage the restaurant, it is plain that your wife has qualifications in business and finance and had worked for a bank for a number of years and now works for a private entity which involves looking at clients’ business plans to ensure that their investments are viable and comply with financial regulations. She already helps out to some degree in the restaurant. It seems to me that your wife, in combination with your younger sisters, who are bright university students studying science, should be able to arrive at some arrangement to manage the restaurant, although your wife apparently is continuing to pay the mortgage on your investment property at Nutwood Street.
30 Also in support of exceptional hardship, Mr van de Weil relied upon your wife’s condition of endometriosis. Apparently she is to undergo some procedure this year to see whether her fertility can be restored so that she can have a child. She is now 36 years old and, in the eight years of your marriage, she has not been able to conceive a child. There was no medical evidence tendered as to what the chances of your wife conceiving a child might be if the procedure she proposes to undertake is successful. I consider this to be somewhat vague support for the proposition of exceptional hardship.
31 Mr Nguyen, for an offender to rely upon hardship that imprisonment creates for people other than himself, is an appeal for mercy. The legal authorities make it plain that the Court’s discretion to exercise mercy on that basis should only be exercised in exceptional circumstances.[4] This is because that imprisoning a person will usually adversely impact on that person’s family. I am obliged to pronounce a sentence that reflects the gravity of the offending of which the jury has found you guilty. The law recognises that if lenience is given to an offender because of family hardship that results in the guilty offender benefitting so that his innocent family will not be so adversely affected. This means that an equally guilty offender who does not have a family in need would unjustly receive a less lenient sentence. This is why the test of exceptional circumstances must be satisfied in the case of family hardship.
[4]Markovic v R; Pantelic v R [2010] VSCA 105
32 On the material put before me, I cannot be satisfied that the matters relating to the family restaurant, your mother’s health or your wife’s situation of treatment for endometriosis and infertility, either separately or in combination meet this high test. However, I do take into account that Dr Tran has stated that your wife, Rachana, has indicated her intention to stand by you and that you have always wished to have children together and that your absence from her in prison as a consequence of this serious offending, is certainly not going to assist with your plans for a family and will be a distress to your wife which, along with your worry about your mother’s health and the family business, will weigh upon your whilst you are in custody. In this regard, I note that the psychological report from Mr Ian Mackinnon makes specific reference to you suffering reactive depression and anxiety relating to these matters, which I take into account as likely to make the serving of a sentence of imprisonment more burdensome.
33 Mr Nguyen, you should be in no doubt as to the seriousness of this offending which is reflected by the maximum penalty of life imprisonment which applies to it. Illicit drugs are a scourge on our society. They are detrimental to the health of those who use them and the relationships of users with others in their family and the community. Drug-related crime is widespread and this, along with necessary health resources for treating drug addicts, places a heavy burden on our community. These type of offences are difficult to detect and require significant resources to do so. They involve a high cost when one considers the amount of time, effort and expense involving our law enforcement personnel, our courts and our prisons. All in all, the scourge of illicit drugs is responsible for a huge toll financially and a very significant adverse impact on the welfare of the whole community.
34 Whilst there is no evidence that you knew of the quantity of methamphetamine involved, the fact of the matter is that, had over 22 kilograms of pure methamphetamine found its way into the community, the potential for harm was very significant, indeed, as was the potential profit, which has been estimated at between $2.2 million and $3.3 million if the methamphetamine was sold wholesale, or between $6.9 million and $13.8 million, if it were to have been sold at street level. There is no evidence as to what amount of profit you were likely to make but, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, it is appropriate to infer in accordance with common sense that you committed this crime for profit. I accept Mr van de Weil’s submission that the evidence of your long term use of ice, as referred to in Mr Mackinnon’s report, is not relevant to the sentencing process other than providing context or possible motivation for your offending. Certainly it is not mitigatory. Further, I accept that there is no evidence that you were gambling in 2017 in the lead up to the offending, although it is plain from the evidence of your brother in law, Dr Tran, that you did have outstanding debts to himself and your mother dating back to 2013 or 2014. Again, these matters are irrelevant to sentencing except that they may also provide some motivation for your offending.
35 The steps which you took to attempt to obtain possession involved using a false name, Jacky Tran, in dealings with the federal agent posing as a delivery driver and making your investment property at Nutwood Street available as the delivery address, as well as making yourself available to accept the delivery. You had possession of the consignment phone in order for arrangements to be made concerning the delivery and you did make those arrangements with the federal agent posing as a delivery driver. You attended at your Nutwood Street property on the morning appointed for delivery in order to accept the consignment and were in possession of keys to the property, the consignment phone and a means of identification for Jacky Tran by way of the “MyPost” card.
36 There is evidence that there was an actual person called Jacky Tran who was known to you. On his mobile phone with the number ending in 418, federal agents found evidence of the falsification of a licence of Rachel Henderson.[5] This, unknown to Ms Henderson, was converted into a licence with a different residential address and photo and the 418 phone was subscribed to in her name. The 418 phone number was the one which had been supplied to Australia Post back in April 2017 when the MyPost cards were obtained. It appears that another person or persons were involved in creating a false licence so that the 418 phone could be subscribed in the name on that false licence. There is also evidence that Jacky Tran used a “jackymoon” gmail address which was the address provided to Australia Post in order to obtain the MyPost card. However, these matters do not lessen the fact that you played a crucial role in enabling this very valuable consignment of methamphetamine to be delivered to your Nutwood Street address and, had it not been for the intervention of federal agents, this large amount of illicit drugs would have found their way into the community with the potential for great harm.
[5] Exhibit 1 at the trial
37 Courts have repeatedly emphasised that the difficulty in detecting the importation of illicit drugs and the great social harm that they cause mean that the principal emphasis in sentencing should be upon deterrence and stern punishment. The courts must signal to would-be drug traffickers that the potential profit to be gained from such illicit activities will be neutralised by the risk of severe punishment. It is very clear that, unless significant sentences are imposed in relation to offences of this type, then the interests of general deterrence cannot be served. For this reason, the only appropriate sentence is a significant term of imprisonment.
38 In your favour, I take into account that you have a very limited prior criminal history, which occurred quite a long time ago. You are fortunate to have a close, supportive family. Also, notwithstanding a relatively serious head injury some 10 years ago, which has left you with some memory and concentration difficulties, Mr Mackinnon expressed the view that you have a good level of functional intelligence and, being a tertiary qualified person, you appear to possess many of the skills required to successfully operate a business. He opined that, at the time of offending, you probably suffered a substance abuse disorder but do not appear to be inherently antisocial or of a criminal character. He further noted that you managed to work productively despite gambling and substance abuse problems, which “waxed and waned” over the years.
39 I accept that during the time that you spent in custody from June 2017 to January 2018 and from 4 December 2018 to the present time, you have probably had cause to reflect on the very bad choices you have made in your past life and the great shame you have brought upon yourself and the heartache and anxiety caused to your family. I note that Mr Mackinnon expresses the opinion that you have apparently overcome your substance abuse disorder since your arrest in June 2017 and had overcome your problem gambling disorder by 2015 or thereabouts (although I note that Exhibit “4”, the records from Crown Casino, would appear to indicate that it was not until late August 2016 that your activity at Crown Casino ceased). This is to your credit and, taken together with your intelligence, demonstrated capacity for high work and strong family support, I consider that in all of the circumstances your prospects of rehabilitation should be good. You certainly abided by the onerous bail conditions and appear to have worked hard at the family restaurant while you were on bail. I have already acknowledged that your depression and worry about the family business and the health and welfare of your mother and wife, are likely to make serving your sentence more onerous, along with the ongoing grief you suffer due to the death of your father.
40 On the other hand, you continue to maintain your innocence in spite of the jury verdict, so it cannot be said that you are remorseful. You are not entitled to any discount that would have been available had you pleaded guilty. The amount of methamphetamine involved was some 30 times the commercial quantity. Although this factor would assume greater significance if you were proven to have known the weight of the consignment (which is not the case), nevertheless this offending is grave because it had the potential to so adversely impact upon our community. Thus, it must be the subject of a sentence of imprisonment of sufficient severity to appropriately punish you for the wrongdoing and deter others who might consider it a good idea to try to gain profit by trading in illicit drugs.
41 In determining the sentence to be imposed I have taken into account the matters in section 16A of the Crimes Act 1914 (Cth) and had regard to other sentences imposed across Australia for this type of offending and applied the sentencing propositions in cases of this type as approved by the Court of Appeal.[6]
[6]Nguyen v R; Phommalysack v R [2011] VSCA 32
42 On one charge of attempted possession of a commercial quantity of an unlawfully imported border-controlled drug, you are convicted and sentenced to be imprisoned for a period of 10 years.
43 I order that you serve a period of 6 years and 10 months before becoming eligible for release upon parole.
44 I direct that the sentence commence this day.
45 I declare pre‑sentence detention of 283 days to be time reckoned as already served under the sentence imposed this day.
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