Lukas Royal Ray Buchanan: Man jailed for Warwick drug trafficking operation

A former Warwick man has been jailed after he was busted trafficking drugs daily for more than a year, bringing in as much as $1000 in a single sale and putting profits towards his own addiction.

A former Warwick man who ran an 18-month drug trafficking operation that brought in up to $1000 in a single sale has been jailed after facing court for his offending.

Lukas Royal Ray Buchanan’s crimes were brought to light when police raided his home and searched his mobile phone on August 14, 2020.

Warwick District Court was told the now-27-year-old’s messages revealed he had been trafficking marijuana since February 2019, actually supplying the drug on at least 180 occasions and offering to sell it 271 times within that period.

Crown prosecutor Bernard Berger said Buchanan had a regular customer base of about 68 people and mainly trafficked at street level, but had occasionally also made wholesale deals.

“He admitted to supplying on a daily basis and said on some occasions it had been up to a pound per day,” he said.

Buchanan told police he’d made sales as high as $1000 a pound of marijuana on a few occasions and sourced his drugs from suppliers in Warwick, Toowoomba, and the Brisbane area.

Mr Berger told the court Buchanan mainly ran his operation through social media services such as Facebook Messenger and Snapchat, and infrequently enlisted his partner at the time or other acquaintances to make deliveries on his behalf.

The drug trafficking charge was Buchanan’s first run-in with the law, with the former Warwick resident appearing in court with a clean criminal history and his father and step-mother supporting him from the gallery.

Defence barrister Jessica Goldie said Buchanan’s drug addiction began when he was kicked out of home by his mother at 14 years old and was forced to couch-surf while still at school.

“It was around this time that he was using cannabis and that started the problem he’s had for about 10 years leading up to this offending,” Ms Goldie said.

“While the trafficking was commercially-motivated, the profits were relatively low. Certainly it was also feeding his own addiction at the time.

“As a child, he was diagnosed with ADHD and Tourette syndrome, and he used (drugs) as a way of effectively self-medicating.”

Ms Goldie said being charged last year was a wake-up call for Buchanan, who had since separated from his partner but was still living with her and their 12-month-old baby.

She told the court Buchanan had stayed clean and not been found to commit any crimes since his operation was busted, and had also relocated from the Warwick area with his family.

Buchanan pleaded guilty to one count of drug trafficking.

He was sentenced to three years’ jail with eligibility for parole on April 30.