The courts Youth sold cannabis after dole stopped

Press, 12 April 1979, Page 9

The courts Youth sold cannabis after dole stopped

A youth who was selling cannabis to further his education was sentenced to six months periodic detention by Mr Justice Roper in the Supreme Court yesterday. Kerry 7 Daniel Wootton, aged 19, a student, had pleaded guilt’ in the Magistrate’s Court after the taking of depositions to a charge of possession of cannabis for supply and was committed to the Supreme Court for sentence. Evidence was given that when the police searched Wootton’s room in a flat in Avonside Drive they found 45 plastic bags containing 443 grams of cannabis. Wootton said that he had grown most of the cannabis himself at Port Levy and had originally intended it for his own use. However, when his unemployment benefit was stopped after he refused to take a job that had been offered through the Labour Department he started selling cannabis at the Marine Hotel, Sumner, for money to go to art school. The plastic bags of cannabis were sold between .$l2

?'and $2O depending on who - was buying it and he made t about $BO a week. I Mr G. K. Panckhurst ap- - peared for the Crown. Mr K. N. Hampton, for , Wootton, said that it was an 1 unusual case because he had ■ admitted not only that the ? cannabis was his, but also f that he intended to sell it. r W’ootton was very frank I with the police and gave r them a detailed statement. Wootton had been int volved in the use of can--1 nabis for about two years, i but it was only recently that 1 he conceived the plan to sell ; some of the cannabis he was . growing for his own use to 1 provide funds for a fine arts > course. 1 If all the cannabis had ■ been sold it would have fetched about $9OO. A person ■ of ability and intelligence s Wootton would have a good ) future when he matured. i He had left high school at ■ an early age, but he now ■ regretted that decision and i was attending adult high i school classes with a view to taking a fine arts course ■ at university. Wootton had ! learnt his lesson, been frank

witn the police and had pleaded guilty, Mr Hampton said. “Well at least Wootton you made no bones about it,” his Honour said. “You were subsidising your finances by selling cannabis so that you could continue your education. You present a real problem. At 19 you have no previous convictions but the quantity involved was quite substantial.” Before coming to Court he had a look at sentences which had been imposed recently on similar charges and he agreed with Mr Pankhurst that this was verymuch a borderline case as far as imprisonment was concerned. “I think you should be given the opportunity to continue your education although the sentence I am going to impose is going to cause some difficulties for you as you attend art classes on a Saturday morning. I sincerely hope that this has been a lesson to you, Wootton, because you are really in the danger zone having a conviction like this,” said his Honour.