Former heroin addict Robert James Evans jailed for trafficking marijuana
A former heroin addict with criminal records across multiple states trafficked an illicit drug for almost four years, carrying out more than 300 supplies.
Police & Courts
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A former heroin addict with Victorian and Queensland criminal records has been jailed for trafficking an illicit drug for three years and nine months.
During the period of offending he carried out more than 300 supplies.
Robert James Evans, 40, mostly supplied marijuana to seven customers, but he also supplied methamphetamines twice – on August 17, 2020, and August 4, 2021.
He pleaded guilty in Rockhampton District Court to one count of drug trafficking.
Crown prosecutor Terance McCosker said the extent of his trafficking was revealed when police looked at the content on his phone.
Police executed a search warrant on Evans’s residence on September 1, 2021, locating 198 grams of marijuana in various amounts and packaging, along with digital scales, clip-seal bags, used pipes and syringes.
They also located fentanyl strips Evans was using.
Defence barrister Maree Willey said Evans had been on the suboxone program since 2009 due to a heroin addiction and engaged with Alcohol Tobacco and Other Drugs Services since 2016.
She said he was introduced to drugs when he was 13 by a family friend.
She said there were gaps in his criminal histories in both states – seven years and five years – where Evans maintained employment and abstained from smoking marijuana.
Ms Willey said prior to this offending, Evans was working as a forklift driver in Rockhampton but was made redundant.
She said he had money in the bank and started smoking marijuana again, turning to trafficking when the money ran out.
Ms Willey said he had not reoffended since his arrest for this offending and had been working with his father at his businesses – a storage unit business and a now-closed gel blaster shop.
Evans was sentenced to three years prison with parole set for December 18, 2023.
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