Queensland dad Richard Kaye faces court for sentencing submissions after attempted cross-country weed trafficking
The reason a desperate father was busted with more than $90,000 of cannabis in a traffic stop near Adelaide Oval has been revealed in court.
A Queensland dad arrested outside Adelaide Oval with nearly 10kg of cannabis was told he could pay off his $12,000 drug debt – and make a profit – if he flew to South Australia to oversee a trafficking operation worth up to $90,000.
Richard Karl Kaye, 54, faced the District Court for sentencing submissions earlier this month after pleading guilty to one count of trafficking a large commercial quantity of a controlled drug.
Kaye, who moved to Queensland from Adelaide in 2020, was pulled over by police who found a tool chest containing 21 vacuum-sealed inside his hire car last August.
“Unexpectedly, he bumped into a person (in Queensland) that he had known while he was in Adelaide,” Wayne Carlin, for Kaye, told Judge Nicholas Alexandrides.
“That liaison resulted in an assault on Mr Kaye, arising from an outstanding drug debt that he had in SA of $12,000.
“That’s where some real problems started for him – it was in the background of a drug debt that he was told there was a way he could pay off that debt and make money.
“He flew down from Queensland and hired a car from the airport on the same day. He spent that night in a hotel and then, the following day, attended a business address where he packed the cannabis into a trunk – 21 vacuum-sealed bags, in total 9.2kg of cannabis.”
Kaye was tasked with transporting the tool chest from the business address to a service station just outside Adelaide Airport, where it would be collected and taken to a bus freight service.
While on the way back to the airport, he was stopped by police on the corner of Sir Edwin Smith Ave and War Memorial Drive.
Kaye, a father of three, had initially denied the charges but changed his pleas prior to his arraignment for trial.
He previously told a court he wasn’t aware of what was inside the chest, and wasn’t receiving any payment for the delivery.
However, during submissions, Mr Carlin told Judge Alexandrides his client was initially paid $1000, but “stood to make around $6000”.
“Mr Kaye’s role in the trafficking was to assist in the overseeing of the transporting of the packing,” Mr Carlin submitted. “Indeed, his fingerprints were found on the packaging.
“I understand that the cannabis would then be taken by a bus to Queensland, and then he would rendezvous in Queensland and collect the trunk.”
Mr Carlin asked the court to consider suspending any further time in custody because, once released, Kaye intends to return to Queensland and “rebuild a relationship with his children”.
Judge Alexandrides remanded Kaye in custody to return to court in November for sentencing.
