Fugitive drug kingpin Robert Gordon Gee jailed for almost 20 years for 2006 drug trafficking offences

After almost a decade on the run overseas – including a stint in a Thai jail – a fugitive Adelaide drug trafficker has been sentenced for his role in a huge drug syndicate.

Robert Gordon Pollybank Gee has been jailed after years on the run overseas.

A fugitive Adelaide drug trafficker who fled to Thailand on a fake passport – where he was jailed – has been jailed for almost 20 years for his “pivotal” role at the apex of the “highly sophisticated” syndicate.

Robert Gordon Pollybank Gee, 64, was first arrested in June 2006 with four others after a police raid that netted $1.2m worth of drugs. He fled overseas in 2011, slipping into Thailand just as he was about to stand trial in Adelaide and became one of the state’s most wanted men.

Thai authorities caught up with him in 2016, where he was arrested for living illegally on a fake passport. After serving a prison term in Thailand for that offending, Gee was extradited back to South Australia in December 2020 to face the 2006 drugs charges.

In sentencing in the District Court on Thursday, now Supreme Court Justice Julie McIntyre said Gee – who sought a merciful sentence due to his age, ill-health and the impact of his time in a Thai jail – was the “author of your own misfortune”.

“Your role was pivotal and significant,” she said.

“The fact that you chose to engage in offending of such seriousness with such adverse social consequences in our community weighs heavily in the sentencing process.

“The operation was sophisticated, for example efforts were made to avoid detection including you and your co-offenders operating multiple mobile phones and SIM cards – some in false names.”

Gee previously pleaded guilty to multiple charges involving the sale and possession of illicit drugs including cocaine, methamphetamine, LSD and MDMA just as he was again due to stand trial last year.

During the 2006 raid police, who had been monitoring seven mobile services linked to Gee as part of Operation Crunch, netted 8.8kg of methamphetamine, 7113 MDMA tablets, 8347 LSD papers and 886 LSD tablets. They also found almost $250,000 cash.

The raid came about after a phone call between Gee and another man, who was previously sentenced for his role in the syndicate, which revealed a “stock take” of a variety of drugs, including $360,850 cash hidden at the other man’s mother’s home.

The wanted poster for Robert Gordon Gee.

At the time Gee was living in Sydney, but was providing instructions to that man to provide the illicit substances as they were ordered by three others who then on-sold the drugs.

Justice McIntyre accepted Gee’s offending was, in part, motivated by a gambling debt he had claimed reached $400,000 at the time of his offending.

But, she said the evidence he gave about the debt during a disputed facts hearing was of “some concern”. The man to whom he owed the debt died overseas in 2011.

“Your evidence was vague, and in many respects, unhelpful,” Justice McIntyre said.

Despite the significance of the amount of drugs being trafficked, she said Gee was not living a lavish lifestyle at the time of his offending.

“Your motivation was financial, even if that amounted to no more than paying gambling debts,” she said.

She said Gee, a former adult entertainment services provider and swim school operator, had multiple prior convictions for drug offending but was now at a “low risk” of reoffending.

After credit for his pleas and time spent in custody, Justice McIntyre jailed Gee for 19 years and six months. She set a non-parole period of 12 years, backdated to December 2020 when Gee was extradited back to Australia.

He will be 74 when he is eligible for parole.