Property developer Matthew Doyle jailed over 300kg cocaine plot
From snorting cocaine among Sydney’s high society to a jail cell, high-flying property developer Matthew Doyle has been jailed over an international plan to smuggle up to 300kg of cocaine into Australia.
Police & Courts
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From snorting cocaine among Sydney’s high society to a jail cell, high flying property developer Matthew Doyle was jailed for a minimum of five years on Friday over an international plan to smuggle up to 300kg of cocaine into the country.
Doyle, 32, and two of his private school mates, Jared Hart, 31, and Raoul Kesby, 29, faced maximum sentences of life behind bars with a standard non-parole term of 15 years.
But with their devastated families in court, Judge Penny Hock said they were all young men with good prospects of rehabilitation.
Doyle had been played for a criminal and a fool by undercover cops from Los Angeles to Sydney who even asked Doyle at one stage if he was sure this is what he wanted to do, the court heard.
But the fact that there really was no cocaine involved did little to reduce the seriousness of their offences, Judge Hock said in Sydney’s District Court.
She said Doyle was motivated by greed, Hart owed $60,000 to the ATO after running up debts in his electrician business because of his drug use and Kesby had been promised $20,000 to pick up what the trio of former party boys thought was cocaine from an undercover cop’s car.
When they opened one of the 50 duct-taped blocks and realised they had been tricked, Doyle, who had put up over $500,000 in advance, desperately tried to call one of the undercover operatives and told him: “Please answer me because I’m going to be shot over this.”
They were arrested almost a year ago to the day, on September 3, 2019.
The judge said she took into account their pleas of guilty for which they received a 25 per cent reduction on their sentences.
She revealed that although Doyle had no previous convictions, he had been a “substantial” cocaine dealer.
Instead of becoming Sydney’s cocaine king, he looked subdued as he was sentenced, sporting prison greens and a big beard in place of his uniform of linen shirts, expensive watches and designer sunglasses which he had sported while mixing with Sydney’s young and beautiful elite.
Before his arrest, Doyle, from Burraneer in Sydney’s south, and his wife Kelsea, a socialite and publicist who once worked for fashion brand Camilla and Marc, were the picture of success.
Just three years ago, Doyle was an emerging young star in the business world after launching his app, Zen Now, co-founded with Melissa Rohlf and dubbed the ‘Uber of Massage’. Profiled on David Koch’s ‘Kochie’s Business Builders’, Rohlf credited Doyle’s extensive network and business background as integral to building the company, which planned to go national.
And on social media, the handsome Doyle never seemed far from a sun-drenched party.
Clad in linen shirts, expensive watches and designer sunglasses, Doyle and his wife were familiar faces on the social scene, often spotted at Bondi Icebergs and partying in the eastern suburbs. In other posts, they were seen enjoying lavish holidays in villas in Asia and lounging on the back of a speed boat in Europe.
Doyle’s picture perfect image culminated in the couple’s summer wedding last year when he married Kelsea in a lavish ceremony overlooking the Harbour Bridge and Sydney Opera House. Surrounded by glamorous friends, the couple walked down an aisle of white petals before their reception at Bennelong Point. The bride wore two designer dresses from Monique Lhuillier and Naeem Khan.
Buying up apartments across the city, Doyle had amassed an impressive property portfolio at the time of his arrest. Supreme Court documents showed he was involved in residential properties and developments worth millions of dollars. That portfolio, along with shares in 16 companies and a series of expensive cars, were among assets seized by authorities.
During his trial, his barrister, Phillip Boulten SC said Doyle had hardly led an unblemished life, but was ‘very aware’ of the wrongs he had committed and the harm he had caused.
He asked for leniency on the basis that Doyle has been unable to see his family, and in particular his young son, since March due to COVID-19 restricting prison visits.
Doyle’s wife, Kelsea Nagel Doyle continues to live at her husband’s $2 million home in Burraneer in Sydney’s south while the rest of his property empire has crumbled after the NSW Crime Commission won an order freezing millions of dollars worth of his real estate, cars and company shares under proceeds of crime laws.