A man who pleaded guilty to being in possession of class A, B and C drugs, has been sentenced to 12 months in prison.

Ross Menton, 31, of Rosemount, Douglas, also pleaded guilty to possession of criminal property, namely £43,000 in cash.

Prosecutor Roger Kane told the court how on February 18, police executed a search warrant at Menton’s home where he produced 4g of cocaine in a wrap from his pocket, with a street value of £400.

joints

He also had two joints, believed to be worth between £8 and £12, 0.8g of cannabis worth £16 and 184 diazepam tablets, valued at between £92 and £184. Menton said all of the drugs were for personal use.

On September 7, when Menton was on court bail for the other offences, a witness was contacted on Facebook by her cousin in the UK asking her to collect a package from Menton’s address.

She was told it would contain trainers so she agreed to collect it.

At first the woman, who took her mother with her, could get no answer at the address but then Menton arrived and put the package in her car saying ’I’m glad to be rid of these’, which she said made her suspicious.

Mr Kane told the court that Menton had used a code word to ensure he was handing the package to the correct person.

The woman said that the package appeared too heavy for trainers so she opened it and found the cash inside.

She called police who then arrested Menton.

Defence advocate Paul Glover told Deemster Graeme Cook that Menton had been asked to repackage three packages into one larger package, but while he believed it could contain criminal earnings, the money did not belong to him.

Mr Glover said Menton had began to use drugs ’as a crutch’ after being separated from his children, who reside in the UK.

He said his client had ’taken an extremely stupid decision’.

However, he added that Menton is working with the addiction agency Motiv8 and ’feels better’ having been able to spend time thinking while he was on remand.

Mr Glover said his client realised he had been ’taken advantage of’ and that he wants to break from the cycle of drug use.

sophistication

In sentencing, Deemster Cook was critical of Menton refusing to name who had put him up to sending the money and said the crime showed ’a little bit of sophistication’ due to the use of a codeword.

Deemster Cook decided that he could not suspend Menton’s sentence due to the amount of cash involved, ’£43,000 is a lot of money’ he said.

Menton was sentenced to 12 months for the criminal possession charge, with 30 days for cocaine possession, two weeks for cannabis possession and one week for possession of diazepam to run concurrent.