Melbourne DJs swallowed ketamine and smuggled it into Australia
TWO Melbourne DJs each swallowed nearly half a kilogram of wax-covered ketamine and smuggled it into Australia from India in a dangerous plot, a court has heard.
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TWO Melbourne DJs each swallowed nearly half a kilogram of wax-covered ketamine and smuggled it into Australia from India in a dangerous plot, a court has heard.
In a Delhi apartment in April 2016, Robert Oung and fellow DJ Kasey Taylor each gulped down about 70 cling-wrapped, wax-dipped portions of the party drug before boarding a flight back to Melbourne Airport.
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But they were stopped by border control officials and Oung admitted swallowing 445 grams of ketamine.
Oung, 43, passed about half of the ketamine-filled “pellets” at the airport and the rest after he was taken to hospital.
Judge Gregory Lyon called the ketamine plot a “doubly-dangerous venture”, given the health risks involved as well as the criminal penalties.
“You took an enormous risk in swallowing such a large amount of it,” the judge said.
The judge said Oung and Taylor were friends who shared a fondness for dance music and taking ketamine before they set off for India.
At the time, Oung was a club promoter, bicycle mechanic and volunteer presenter for dance radio station Kiss FM.
“Your ketamine use was getting out of control,” Judge Lyon said.
The trip to India was seen as a “last hurrah” for Oung, who realised he needed to stop using the drug, the judge said.
Taylor was the main architect of the plot, while Oung was a courier but he had been promised $15,000 for his role.
Oung made full admissions to police but still took his case to trial, arguing he didn’t believe the drugs would be sold.
But the jury swiftly found him guilty of importing a marketable quantity of ketamine.
Oung, who was born in the UK, has not spent time in custody before and since his arrest he’s been drug free.
He met a new partner while on bail and the pair have been living by the sea in Rye, fixing and selling BMX bicycles together.
Oung was sentenced in the County Court today to three years’ jail and must serve at least six months before being released on a three-year good-behaviour bond.