Market gardener jailed for illegal crop

Press, 26 February 1987, Page 41

Market gardener jailed for illegal crop

PA Auckland A Mangere tomato grower, Roger Berkley Morton, says he frequently has problems with raiding children — but never anything like the trouble that started when eight youths tried to steal a $114,000 cannabis crop from his garden. The police, called to investigate the teenagers after being tipped off by neighbours, arrested three of the group, then arrested Morton, aged 58, and his friend Barry David James Stacey, aged 45. The men were jailed when they appeared in the District Court at Auckland, Morton for 18 months after he admitted jointly cultivating the ■ drug, and Stacey for three <. years after he admitted charges of cultivation and . possession for supply. The police found the ; youths’ getaway car laden with cannabis on May 2, last year. So too was Sta- , vehicle. In ttie roof

of Morton’s house 17 rubbish bags of cut cannabis were stored with up to another two bags drying out under the ceiling. On the 1.22 ha property the police said there were about 425 mature plants. Of these, about 90 were up to 60cm in height, and in one patch 27 plants topping 3m were found. The police estimated that there would have been 52kg of usable drug among the 800 kg of plant material. They estimated its street value at about $114,000. Giving evidence before his sentencing, Morton said Stacey had asked if he could grow some cannabis on the property. He said yes because he had seen his friend “near death” from chronic asthma, and cannabis apparently helped open his breathing passages.

Morton said he had seen Mangere go from a rural area to a built-up suburb. His property suffered from vandalisrri and

petty thefts. Stacey helped him with repairs and he allowed his friend to have an area in the front of the property to grow some of his own produce. For Morton, Mr Jim Boyack said the Court had seldom seen before it “so good and morally innocent a man.” His client led a simple peasant’s existence in the garden which he bought in the late 19405. Morton was devoted to his sick father, aged 91, and his mother, aged 89, who lived nearby. Mr Boyack said the defendant was a first offender who would not offend again. He submitted that a jail term was not required to protect the community. For Stacey, Mr Grant Illingworth said his client began suffering bad asthma in 1980. His mother had died of the condition. The inevitable jail term would be hard because a claustrophobic

anxiety associated with bis asthma would make life more of an ordeal than for the normal prisoner. The respiratory complaint had stopped Stacey working as a concrete worker. After initially growing for his own use he saw an opportunity to make some money so that he could start in business and support his wife and child, aged four. Stacey had estimated that he could make about $40,000 from the venture and was surprised to hear the police valuation.

Judge Richardson said there was an “aura of arrogance or brazenness” about the cultivation which was done in a residential area under the very noses of the police and the public.

A deterrent sentence was needed to warn fanners or market gardeners who were tempted to grow cannabis in harsh economic times.