SEX & CROCS TO DRUGS & COPS
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A FORMER croc-wrangler caught selling drugs from behind the counter at her Pinelands sex shop has avoided a conviction after claiming she was selling the product as “incense”.
Simone “Chase” Johnson, 51, pleaded guilty in the Darwin Local Court to supplying synthetic cannabis from her Just 4 Play Adult Boutique after she was busted in an undercover sting in August.
The court heard the former Crocosaurus Cove crocodile manager ordered 123 3g packets labelled Purple Haze on three separate occasions before it was picked up by a sniffer dog at the Winnellie post office.
An undercover cop went to the shop and spoke to Johnson’s employee, Brenda Blair, saying: “I heard you have some good incense.”
“I have some good stuff, other people that have used it tell me it’s really good stuff,” Blair replied. “We don’t sell it to everyone because we don’t want heaps of scumbags coming in here, so just keep it to yourself.”
After buying the drugs, the officer returned to the shop and bought more Purple Haze from Johnson, who told her: “That’s fine, we obviously don’t want everyone knowing that we’ve got it.
“We’ve got a permit for it, but it doesn’t mean they can’t just walk in and take it from us whenever they want,” Johnson said. She also offered the cop a discount on her next purchase if she brought back the branded bags saying, “that way we don’t have these bags just laying around and everyone finding out about us”.
Prosecutor Luke McLaughlin said Johnson sold the drugs for $70 a bag and would have netted more than $3000 from the amount later seized by police.
But her lawyer, Amy Noble, said Johnson had researched the drug online before it was added to the list of illegal cannabis alternatives, and believed it was still legal at the time.
“The defendant has not been supplying these drugs – this incense – on the streets, she’s selling it within her business.
“It’s not being sold in a clandestine way due to her fear that they were illegal, but rather keeping the product behind the counter as it is often stolen,” she said.
“In selling the product she wanted to ensure, even though she understood it to be legal, that she could vet the people purchasing to ensure it was being used as its intended purpose, that is as an incense.”
Blair also pleaded guilty to drug supply. Judge Michael Carey handed both women six month good behaviour bonds without conviction.