‘Bleak’ future for drug dealer with ‘deplorable’ history

He’s had the whole gamut of sentencing options but he’s defied them all. Jail is now his only option.

Dale Christopher Smelt, 36, has been jailed again after committing more drug offences while out on parole. Picture: Facebook

A DRUG dealer's "deplorable" criminal and traffic history has caught up with him.

Offending again just three months after he was last released on parole, Dale Christopher Smelt, 36, had few excuses left this time.

"The prospects of your rehabilitation do not seem to be … very good," Justice David North said told him in Mackay Supreme Court yesterday.

"In fact, one would say it was bleak if the past is to be taken into account as the guide of the future."

Police executed a search warrant at his Mackay home on August 28 last year.

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Officers found three clipseal bags containing 4.102g of methylamphetamine with a 77.5 per cent purity.

Crown legal officer Ryan Godfrey said Smelt possessed the drug for commercial purposes and that was not contested.

He said police found a mobile phone that showed two instances of supplying drugs, digital scales and a tick sheet with four entries.

Officers also found $2435 cash at the home.

The court heard Smelt had nine pages of criminal history and 16 pages of traffic history.

Mr Godfrey said this history demonstrated Smelt's poor attitude toward court orders and dangerous drugs.

He said the history included 18 convictions for possessing dangerous drugs, eight convictions for failing to appear and breaching bail and three convictions for assaulting or obstructing a police officer.

He noted fines, good behaviour bond, probation, parole, suspended sentences, intensive correction orders nor jail terms had curbed Smelt's offending.

 

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The court heard Smelt was a repeat disqualified driver and in 2017 had been caught drug-driving.

In a recent sentence, a court added nine months jail cumulative on top of other jail sentences with a parole eligibility date of May 29, 2019.

That was three months before this new drug offending occurred, while he was on parole.

His parole was revoked in December 2019 and he was returned to custody on Australia Day this year.

The full-time release date for previous offending is March 15, 2021 but Mr Godfrey said 243 days of pre-sentence custody could be declared from March 18 this year.

He suggested two to two-and-a-half years in jail, cumulative on other sentences, was needed for community protection.

Defence barrister Stephen Byrne said his client was a qualified boat builder by trade, able to work on fibreglass and timber vessels, but had picked up a further certificate in welding while in prison so he was now skilled to work on steel and metal boats.

He said COVID-19 had prevented his client from completing substance abuse program while in jail.

Mr Byrne said Smelt's inability to find work had led him to illicit drugs.

Justice David North said the deplorable history and the jail time Smelt faced was his own making but he needed to balance that so the overall effect of the sentence was not crushing.

"You have an appalling record of offending and reoffending over the past 19 years or so," he said.

"In submissions it is suggested an analysis of the criminal history would show at least 18 convictions involving dangerous drugs

"Methylamphetamine is a well-known addictive drug that causes no end of harm in our community including collateral crime."

Justice North sentenced Smelt to two years in jail. He will be eligible to apply for parole on June 15, 2021.

Fellow Mackay man Brendan Charles Camilleri, also received a jail sentence in Mackay Supreme Court yesterday but he does not have to serve actual custody.

Justice North said there were realistic prospects for Camilleri's rehabilitation.

He sentenced Camilleri to three-and-a-half years in jail for trafficking drugs and two years of probation for possessing a large amount of marijuana.

He wholly suspended the jail sentence which will hang over Camilleri's head for four years.

 

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