Rohan Wakefield pleads guilty on eve of trial to possessing drugs and military grade firearms
A man, 35, has plead guilty to possessing military grade firearms and flushing “large amounts” of drugs down the drain.
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Operation Ironside has claimed another scalp with a young man caught with military grade firearms pleading guilty during pre-trial proceedings.
Rohan Wakefield, 35, of Piccadilly, was arrested on January 12, 2020 after high powered firearms were found in secret compartments in a ute at his home.
On Thursday, Wakefield pleaded guilty to all charges but participation in a criminal organisation – which was subsequently dropped. Wakefield was charged with possession of illegal firearms, ammunition and a silencer and trafficking in a controlled drug.
Wakefield was one of the first people charged as a result of information stemming from the encrypted AN0M app.
He was a user of an AN0M phone and prosecutors said they would use messages sent over the encrypted AN0M communications app to show that Wakefield had been a courier for a larger syndicate and was holding the guns and drugs for them.
The court heard he will not be charged with additional offending, but further prosecution allegations for which he was not charged could be taken into account by Supreme Court Justice Adam Kimber.
Police found the guns, which included a military grade Steyr AUG 5.56, which was believed to be stolen from the Australian Defence Force, and a Colt AR15 5.56 semiautomatic rifle with a scope attached, at Wakefield’s Newton home.
Ammunition and a silencer were also found in the haul.
At the time of the seizure, police said the Australian Defence Force were investigating whether the Steyr rifle has been stolen at some point prior to it being given to Wakefield. There is no allegation Wakefield stole the rifle and the court has heard no information on the investigation.
The court heard Wakefield also flushed a large amount of methamphetamine down his kitchen sink.
The amount of the drug was never able to be proved, so Wakefield was only charged with trafficking in a controlled drug, rather than a larger quantity.
After Wakefield entered his guilty pleas, a prosecutor applied for his bail to be revoked.
Andrew Culshaw, for Wakefield, argued for his client to be allowed to remain in the community and indicated he would be seeking a home detention sentence for his client.
“Everyone at the bar table is in furious agreement that Wakefield is at the absolute bottom of the food chain of the criminal enterprise in which he was involved,” he said.
“He enters his plea with his eyes wide open, in full knowledge that a possible outcome of his pleas is that he’ll go to jail.”
Mr Culshaw said his client had spent seven months on home detention and the rest of his time in the community on supervised bail – with “exemplary” results.
“His community corrections officer has also offered to write Wakefield a personal letter of support in respect of sentencing submissions, which is something that in my time in practice, I haven’t heard of,” he said.
A prosecutor said that AN0M messages would show that Wakefield had been actively seeking work as a drug courier and had been moving drugs for a larger syndicate since September 2019.
Justice Kimber cancelled Wakefield’s bail and remanded him in custody until February next year for sentencing submissions.
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