Christopher Leonard McTackett pleads guilty to drug trafficking

An NQ dad learnt his fate for trafficking $16 million dollars worth of meth, using coded messages, radio jammers, and police scanners to evade detection. When he wasn’t running meth, he was playing video games.

Townsville Police seized more than $5 million worth of ice and $850,000 cash in a major drug operation. Photo: QPS

A major drug trafficker photographed his toddler son playing with $75,000 in cash that formed part of a $20 million drug operation, the Supreme Court heard.

Christopher Leonard McTackett, 35, had pleaded guilty to seven drug related charges including trafficking and supplying dangerous drugs.

When asked about photographing his son playing with drug dollars on the floor, McTackett replied: “I’m embarrassed to admit, at the time, I thought it was cool.”

Questioned under oath at his sentence hearing on Monday, McTackett said he had used drugs for all of his adult life, particularly methamphetamine since his early 20s.

“I used anything I could get,” he said while giving evidence at his hearing.

Christopher McTackett was on bail before being hauled back into custody. Generic image.

At one stage under lengthy questioning from Crown prosecutor Monique Sheppard, he exclaimed: “You are trying to make me out to be some kind of mastermind, when I’m just a junkie.”

But Justice David North declared that McTackett was a serious drug trafficker and not just an addict as he had tried to portray, then sentenced him to 12 years’ imprisonment.

Christopher McTackett learnt his fate in the Townsville Supreme Court. Picture: Shae Beplate.

Ms Sheppard earlier told the court McTackett had been the main supplier of meth and cannabis to prolific drug peddler Steven James Rush, who has been convicted of trafficking four times.

In 2021, Rush was given an 11-year sentence over what was then described as a ‘very significant’ drug operation where he trafficked meth for about six months between March and September 2019.

McTackett said he met Rush through a friend in Townsville and he said he could get drugs at a better price than Rush had been using.

He said the drugs were sourced through his now jailed half-brother Beau Walmsey in Brisbane.

He said at first Rush intimidated him, but admitted that they then became firm friends.

The court heard that in the six month period in 2019 the pair moved 16 kgs of methamphetamine worth up to $16 million and 115 kgs of cannabis worth more than $3 million around Townsville.

McTackett’s father said he did not see his son taking drugs, but noticed him talking quickly.

“They were selling by the kilo and the pound and that figure may not even be what was really exchanged between those two men,” said Ms Sheppard.

She said McTackett made at least eight trips from Brisbane to Townsville in those six months carrying significant amounts of meth and cannabis for Rush to distribute.

The court heard that he was paid in both cash and drugs for his supplying operation.

McTackett admitted he had a police scanner in vehicles that were used to transport drugs, as well as a radio jammer and a money counting machine that police located in his father’s Townsville bedroom.

Ms Sheppard revealed that McTackett and Rush used coded messages to communicate about their major drug operation, which was one of the biggest ice busts in Townsville in two decades.

McTackett’s father David Andrew McTackett and his younger brother Correy David McTackett both gave evidence on Monday that Christopher was an ice addict.

David said his son was talking quickly, sweating profusely, hard to understand and hyperactive during the six months in question in 2019.

But he said he never saw him taking drugs.

Correy said he was sure his older brother was smoking methamphetamine in the bedroom at his father’s house and it left a distinctive smell.

“He was in a manic state, very erratic, spending hours and hours playing video games in the bedroom and then sleeping for days,” he told the court.

Christopher McTackett told the court he wasn’t a mastermind, just a junkie. Picture: Shae Beplate.

In her summary, Ms Sheppard rejected the evidence of both David and Corey McTackett.

She also described Christopher McTackett as an ‘unreliable and dishonest witness’.

She said his evidence was littered with ‘evasion, contradictions and convenient lapses of memory’.

McTackett’s defence barrister, Chris Minnery, disagreed with the prosecutor and said the evidence given by his client and his family was reliable and credible.

He said that McTackett was in the grip of methamphetamine and using about two grams per day during the six-month period in 2019.

“He was heavily affected by drugs and there are a lot of things he didn’t remember,” he said.

Mr Minnery said Rush was more in control of the operation and many of McTackett’s actions were lacking in sense, as he was so affected by drugs.

In his summation Justice North said he did not find Christopher McTackett to be an impressive witness and said he was inclined to be evasive and dissembling.

He said although McTackett was clearly involved in regular drug use, he felt it did not interfere with his capabilities to know what he was doing in relation to the drug enterprise.

“You were not a servant or under the dominion of Rush – you acted independently as a middle man and I would say you were a trafficker of dangerous drugs,” he said.

When sentencing McTackett to 12 years’ jail, Justice North took into account the 326 days he had already spent in pre-sentence custody.

Originally published as Christopher Leonard McTackett pleads guilty to drug trafficking