Drug mum spared jail time
A MOTHER of two found with a large amount of methamphetamine has been spared jail time after it was accepted the drugs did not belong to her.
However, Kathleen Jean Mathews was the occupier of the Kingsthorpe residence searched by police on March 20, 2018, during which the drugs and associated cash were found.
When police arrived with a search warrant about 8.30am that morning and asked the now 37-year-old if she had anything to declare, she had handed them a black Adidas bag in which was a pipe for smoking drugs, Toowoomba Supreme Court heard.
Asked about the pipe, she had replied “no comment”,
Crown prosecutor Mark Green told the court.
Police also found a metal box attached by magnet to the bed frame in her bedroom.
Inside the box police found 22 clip seal bags containing various amounts of methamphetamine and $570 cash which police suspected to be proceeds of drug crime, the court heard.
Of the 24g of substance found in the bags, 18.671g was found to be pure drug which equated to a purity of 77 per cent, the court heard.
Asked about the box and its contents, Mathews had again answered “no comment”.
The estimated street value of the drugs found was up to $14,000, Mr Green said.
The Crown claimed there was a commercial aspect to the drugs found, however, it was accepted the drugs belonged to the defendant’s then boyfriend and the commerciality did not extend to her, though she knew the drugs were there and had been a drug user at the time herself.
Mathews pleaded guilty to possessing meth in an amount above 2g and to possessing $570 suspected as being proceeds of a drug offence.
Her barrister Frank Martin told the court his client had since embarked on a number of counselling courses, had moved away to another town and showed good prospects of rehabilitation.
Justice Peter Applegarth said any possession of drugs in that quantity was “very serious” and sentenced Mathews to two years in jail but ordered she be released on parole immediately.
peter.hardwick@thechronicle.com.au