UK man Saul Andrew Malcolm Sposato asks SA court for merciful sentence over $2 million cocaine bust

This UK man claims he just wanted to surf and chill out in Australia but became a drug trafficker instead. He tells the court it was all for his mum.

A UK man smuggled $2 million in cocaine for the same criminal he took an arson rap for, as a child, to earn “quick money” and get home to his sick mother, a court has heard.

On Tuesday, window cleaner and self-proclaimed “keen surfer” Saul Andrew Malcolm Sposato asked the District Court to impose a “merciful” non-parole period for his crime.

Peter Morrison, for Sposato, said his client had pleaded guilty to attempted trafficking in a large commercial quantity of a controlled drug and “just wants to go home”.

He said Sposato’s offending was rooted in his childhood in Leicester - where he “was not a gang member” but knew many aspiring criminals, and served as his ill mother’s carer.

Saul Andrew Malcolm Sposato, who tried to smuggle 5kg of cocaine worth $2 million into Australia. Picture: Facebook

“As a young man, he served 2 1/2 years on a community service order, having taken the blame for a fire lit by a friend,” Mr Morrison said.

“He’s a novice surfer (who) came to Australia for respite from carer’s fatigue... he expected to continue receiving money from his window-cleaning business but was not flush with cash.

“His mother became gravely ill and he wanted quick money to get to her, which is when he made the poor decision to contact the man for whom he had taken the blame.

“Through that, he committed the offence (which was) amateurish at best.”

Sposato, 30, of the UK, was arrested by Australian Border Force officers in December 2022 while collecting a package.

At the time, prosecutors alleged it contained 5kg of cocaine worth $2 million if sold in street deals.

On Tuesday, Mr Morrison asked Judge Joana Fuller to impose a shorter-than-usual non-parole period so that Sposato could be promptly deported.

At the expiration of that period, he said, Sposato would “be taken into immigration detention” and his departure date determined by the Federal Government.

Hilda Kinuthia, prosecuting, said she did not accept Sposato’s purported motivations.

“This was not a man who was in dire financial straits, his lifestyle was that of a man on holiday staying in very luxurious hotels (paying) $500 a night,” she said.

“People in Australia on tourist visas (who need money) go out and pick strawberries... there were other options open to him (but) he reached out (and) sought to be recruited by organised crime.”

Judge Fuller remanded Sposato in custody for sentencing next week.