Luke Michael Hutchins pleads guilty to drug trafficking

As he was released on parole, he was told a failed drug test would send him back to prison. Rather than heeding that warning, this man began a trafficking business.

After being released on parole in November 2020 for a violent burglary, Luke Michael Hutchins was warned a failed drug test would send him to jail.

“You didn’t just ignore that warning, you started up the business of selling drugs,” Judge Leanne Clare SC said in Mackay District Court.

The court heard Hutchins’ drug dealing, which began one month after his parole release, was a way to fund his expensive party habits.

And it now meant a further two and a half years jail after he pleaded guilty to trafficking and supplying marijuana.

His commercial enterprise of selling mainly street level quantities could rake in as much as $1000 per week of tax-free income, on top of the income he was already receiving from his full-time job.

However, on at least one occasion, he had dealt at a wholesale level three pounds of marijuana.

Police found about $8000 worth of drugs after searching the home of Luke Michael Hutchins. Picture: iStock.

At the time of his arrest in August 2021, Hutchins had operated as a marijuana trafficker for seven months and one week in Mackay.

A search of his property found about $8000 worth of drugs and he said his customers owed him about $9000 from purchases on credit.

Crown prosecutor Farook Anoozer told the court of Hutchins’ extensive criminal history in Queensland.

Mr Anoozer said in 2014, Hutchins was convicted of 10 counts of illegally entering premises or dwellings, and 15 fraud offences.

Hutchins received multiple drug possession charges in the years that followed.

On November 27 2020, he was sentenced to two years in jail with immediate parole after breaking into a former partner’s home and assaulting her.

In December 2020, he began trafficking marijuana.

Mr Anoozer argued the 37 year old was a mature man who offended one month after his parole and pushed for 2.5 to three years jail.

Defence barrister Paul Rutledge argued his client was not a large scale trafficker.

He said Hutchins struggled to find a consistent supplier and his business was not profitable enough to live a life of luxury.

Mr Rutledge said the drug seizure had caused significant stress in his client’s relationship, which had now deteriorated.

He added that Hutchins had also spent eight months in a maximum-security unit at Capricornia Correctional Centre.

The court heard Hutchins had been successful in his early years of work and managed to purchase two houses by the age of 21.

Mr Rutledge said his life began to unravel at age 28 when a relationship breakdown led him to begin using methylamphetamine.

Judge Clare said it was a story all too familiar to judges who serve in the Mackay district.

For this reason, Mr Rutledge said Hutchins planned to distance himself from the region and move interstate upon his release.

Judge Clare said Hutchins “clearly” had valuable skills but had not “demonstrated a personal effort to break with drugs in any meaningful way”.

“You’ve had a useful life and you can have that again if you are motivated to get the help that you need,” she said.

Hutchins was jailed for two and a half years to commence at the expiration of the existing sentence imposed in 2020.

He will be eligible to apply for parole on August 22, 2022.