Student fined for storage shed stash of imported tobacco

A Brisbane student who ordered thousands of cigarettes to an inner-city storage shed has been fined.

A Brisbane student who ordered thousands of cigarettes to an inner-city storage shed has been fined.

Shanjie Jin, 23, was on Friday fined $1000 after attempting to collect a large parcel sent to Kennards Storage Milton on May 20 this year.

Commonwealth prosecutor Gabriel Perry told Brisbane Magistrates Court that Jin pulled up in a silver Audi and told staff he was collecting the parcel, addressed to Donald Jin, for his employer.

He had never been a customer of the Kennards outlet.

Police five days later spoke to Jin, from Rochedale, who said he arranged the parcel to be sent to Brisbane from a friend in Taiwan.

Inside were 24 cartons with a total of 4800 cigarettes.

Mr Perry said duty payable for home consumption would have been $5297.

“The defendant stated that he did not know that was an offence in Queensland,” Mr Perry said.

“The police observed that he was extremely remorseful and apologised for the situation.”

Mr Perry said it could be inferred Jin was attempting to avoid detection by using the storage outlet as a delivery address, a different name and telling staff the parcel was for his boss.

Jin on Friday pleaded guilty to importing tobacco products reckless to as to whether there would be defrauding of the revenue contrary to the Customs Act.

Mr Perry said the maximum penalty for the offence was five years in prison and a $15,891 fine.

Defence lawyer Grace Devereaux said Jin didn’t grow up with the understanding of Australia’s customs legislation and the taxes imposed on cigarettes.

She said the sender of the package new her client as Donald and he didn’t know why the tobacco was sent to Milton.

Ms Devereaux asked Magistrate Rob Turra to consider Jin’s young age, his co-operation with police and the impact a recorded conviction would have.

Mr Turra said he didn’t consider the offence trivial.

He fined Jin $800 and a conviction was recorded.

Originally published as Student fined for storage shed stash of imported tobacco