Ecstasy dealer in prison
A FESTIVAL festival-goer caught smuggling 122 ecstasy pills into Creamfields to sell has been jailed for two years and eight months.
James Thornton, 26, of Stables Way, Rotherham, aroused suspicions when he tried to enter the dance music festival in Daresbury on Saturday, August 27 wearing an entry wristband but with no ticket, prosecutor Kim Egerton told Chester Crown Court last Thursday, March 16.
A security officer was not convinced by his claim that he was epileptic and needed to retrieve his pills.
A sniffer dog alerted police to prohibited substances, which turned out to be 122 MDMA tablets and a small amount of loose MDMA with a total estimated worth of £1,230 stored in a baby wipes packet.
Two mobile phones found on Thornton revealed requests for pills in the lead-up to the festival and attempts to persuade buyers to purchase beforehand to avoid inflated prices once on site. The court heard he had previous convictions and reprimands, for assault, theft and drunk and disorderly, but nothing for drugs.
Miles Wilson, defending, said his client was ‘bright, was an Open University law student, and had references attesting to his ‘exemplary’ character including volunteering time at community garden events for disabled children.
Thornton had also pleaded guilty to one count of possession with intent to supply Class A MDMA. The court heard the sentencing guidelines for this type of offence with a ‘significant role’ had a range of three-and-a-half to seven years with a starting point after trial of four years. He received credit for his guilty plea.
Judge Patrick Thompson, presiding, sentenced him to two years and eight months in prison. Sentencing, he said: “You are a young man certainly not without intelligence but I’m afraid you didn’t put your intelligence to good use in the lead-up to this music festival.
“There were messages on your phone, requests for pills, it’s clear you were involved to some extent in dealing drugs.”
“Anyone who spends time in these courts will see many cases of people caught at Creamfields festival who end up in these courts for supplying drugs for financial gain, and the message has to go out that when they’re caught there has to be an immediate custodial sentence and a significant custodial sentence.”