Ice trafficker avoids serious violent offender label
It is the second time the woman has fronted the supreme court for pushing ice.
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A TWICE convicted ice trafficker has avoided being declared a serious violent offender that would have forced her to serve at least 80 per cent of her seven-year jail term.
Vanessa McKenzie was back before the supreme court today barely 18 months after she breached her suspended sentence handed down in 2015 for pushing and producing methylamphetamines.
In February last year she was released on immediate parole.
But Mackay Supreme Court heard this was about two months into her second trafficking stint.
“It’s very serious offending, it needs to be deterred,” Justice Graeme Crow said.
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“If you traffic and you get out of prison and you traffic again, then the principle of deterrence I’m sure you understand means that you need to go to prison for longer.”
Justice Crow warned McKenzie if she could not kick her drug issue, and the only way to get her fix was through trafficking, then the answer was to “keep amping up those sentences all the way to 25 years and lock you up forever”.
“Because the community will not tolerate people such as you, no matter what your background, no matter what your drug problem, selling that awful drug to the community in which we all live,” Justice Crow said.
“You’ve been given ample chances, at the end of the day it’s only you who can turn your back on drugs.”
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McKenzie pleaded guilty to trafficking a large amount of ice between December 2018 and June 2019.
The court heard she had a hard life, but Justice Crow said the answer was to not sell ice.
“All you are doing is putting dozens, if not hundreds, of young people — and not so young people — into the same predicament that you find yourself in,” Justice Crow said.
The court heard the 46 year old was diagnosed with bipolar and had engaged in all the rehabilitation courses available to her while in pre-sentence custody.
“Your conduct breaches a suspended sentence and also breached parole,” Justice Crow said.
“The most difficult decision … is whether to make the declaration of serious violence offence.
“Because of the harm the trafficking does and because of your antecedence, the declaration of the serious violence offence will mean you will need to serve 80 per cent as a minimum of the sentence imposed.”
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McKenzie was sentenced to cumulative terms totalling seven years jail.
“I considered the matter with some detail and in my view and notwithstanding your dreadful criminal history, notwithstanding the fact that this is the second time you’ve trafficked and you trafficked in breach of a suspended sentence and you trafficked while on parole I will not make the declaration that you’re a serious violent offender,” Justice Crow said.
“I have not taken that view because in this instance I … see that you’ve had a most prejudicial background and you have health problems.”
She will be eligible for parole on October 4, 2021. The 461 days in pre-sentence custody was declared time already served.
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