Joshua Peter Moore jailed for nine years over seized drugs hidden in empty paint tin

A Lamborghini-driving, jet ski riding, Rolex-wearing cocaine trafficker busted after police seized drugs hidden in an empty paint tin, has been jailed for nine years.

Joshua Peter Moore outside the Brisbane Supreme Court. Picture: NewsWire/Tertius Pickard

A Lamborghini-driving, jet-ski-riding, Rolex-wearing cocaine trafficker busted after police seized drugs hidden in an empty paint tin has been jailed for nine years.

During his sentencing hearing on Monday, Brisbane Supreme Court heard Joshua Peter Moore was the boss of a drug ring that hired two couriers who made nine runs to pick up to 3.6kg of cocaine each time from Sydney or the Hunter Valley.

The pair, Mitchell Craig Barrow from Mermaid Waters and Ricardo Felipe Rojas-Miranda, delivered the drugs to Moore’s home in Seven Hills, a leafy suburb on Brisbane’s southside between June 10 and August 11, 2021.

Crown prosecutor Stephanie Gallagher submitted that over five months Moore and his co-accused Daniel Jung-Hyun Cho, trafficked a significant quantity of cocaine around the Gold Coast and Brisbane, sourcing kilograms of cocaine in NSW,

Once it was delivered to Queensland, Moore sold the drugs, selling up to 1kg of cocaine in a single transaction for $230,000, the court heard.

Ms Gallagher told the court that after his arrest in November 2021, police found “trappings of wealth from his drug trafficking” at his home including a jet ski, a Rolex watch and $111,000 in his Lamborghini, which has been forfeited to the state as a proceed of crime.

Moore pleaded guilty to 15 charges. Picture: NewsWire/Tertius Pickard

Moore was arrested after he picked up Barrow in Coolangatta in his car after he had crossed the NSW-Queensland border carrying a 10 litre paint tin and with his dog.

They drove together until police arrested then and found them with 1kg of cocaine in a cryovac bag in a paint tin.

Moore’s defence counsel Alastair McDougall submitted that Moore turned to drugs because his ex-wife’s infidelity on their honeymoon, which led to divorce, and he had also earlier suffered from body dysmorphia as he was bullied as child for being overweight at school.

Mr McDougall told the court that Moore, who worked with ground penetrating radar, turned to crime because it gave him a feeling of success and belonging.

Moore pleaded guilty to 15 charges including trafficking cocaine, possession of cocaine and possession of muscle drugs clenbuterol and trenbolone, synthetic steroid stanozolol, steroid oxandrolone, growth hormone as well as alprazolam and diazepam, a long-lasting benzodiazepine.

Supreme Court Justice Sean Cooper sentenced Moore to nine years’ jail for trafficking and declared 38 days he spent in custody as time already served.

He will be eligible for parole from April 18, 2028.

Cho is facing six charges including trafficking and drug possession and his case is listed for a pre-trial hearing on August 23 with no trial date set.

Barrow was last year sentenced to five years’ jail, wholly suspended after he already served 271 days in pre-sentence custody after he pleaded guilty to trafficking, and he was sentenced to one year in jail for possession.

Rojas-Miranda has been sentenced but details of it have been suppressed by the court.