Former St Kilda star Sam Fisher pleads guilty to drug trafficking, facing five years in jail
The former Saint Kilda defender showed little emotion as he pleaded guilty to being part of a ring that tried to smuggle close to a kilo of meth and other drugs into Victoria hidden in a kitchen rangehood.
Police & Courts
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Fallen AFL star Sam Fisher is facing more than five years behind bars after he admitted his involvement in an interstate drug trafficking ring.
Fisher, who played 228 games for St Kilda, blamed his daily drug habit of meth and GHB, combined with debilitating injuries and the loss of his job, for causing his addiction to spiral “out of control” in 2022.
It was against this backdrop that the 41-year-old became involved in a cross-country drug trafficking network, as police accused him of hiding more than a kilo of meth and cocaine in an oven rangehood to be sent to Western Australia.
Wearing a white shirt, Fisher showed little emotion as he appeared in the County Court via video link on Thursday where he pleaded guilty to six charges including trafficking meth, cocaine and GHB and possessing drugs including LSD, ketamine and testosterone.
“Guilty,” he said when asked for his plea to each charge.
His plea comes after he accepted a judge’s offer, made last week, of a maximum five years and four months jail, with a minimum three years if he pleaded guilty to the charges.
Fisher, who remains on bail, was due to face trial but will now return to court for a pre-sentence hearing on April 29 where he will likely be jailed.
His barrister Dermot Dann KC said character references and material relating to his client’s drug rehabilitation would be prepared ahead of the hearing.
The court previously heard Fisher “spiralled out of control” and was using methamphetamines and up to 30ml of GHB a day when he was arrested by police in May 2022 for trafficking drugs to WA.
The retired footballer had picked up a brand new rangehood from Moorabbin Harvey Norman, which he later delivered — stuffed with 996g of meth and 82g of cocaine — to a Melbourne patisserie owned by the father of his co-accused, Julien Morvan.
Prosecutor Melissa Mahady said there was evidence to suggest Morvan, based in WA, was using the shop “as a place to drop off parcels to be picked up by couriers”.
Fisher came undone when police in WA found a suspicious parcel sent from Morvan and destined for Victoria with $129k cash stuffed inside.
Tracing both men, police intercepted the rangehood parcel sent to Morvan in April, finding just over a kilo of drugs inside.
When officers swooped on Fisher’s Sandringham home on May 18, 2022, Mr Dann said he was “in a very, very bad way”.
So affected by drugs, Mr Dann said Fisher wasn’t in a fit state to be brought before the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court, with his filing hearing going ahead in his absence.
Meanwhile, police raiding his Sandringham home found a bunch of drugs, including GHB in his car alongside “plungers” that Mr Dann said were “consistent with the usage of that particular substance”.
The court heard Fisher had used drugs “recreationally” in the past.
But the former defender’s “drug use intensified” when he was blighted by injuries while playing football for amateur clubs, and when he lost work when a property development he was managing stalled before the pandemic took hold.
In seeking a lesser sentence for his client, Mr Dann highlighted Fisher’s community work while at St Kilda, and that he’d gone “beyond” the 20 mandated sessions a year as part of his contract.
He also handed up a bundle of character references, including from Tony Brown, St Kilda’s Player Development and Welfare Manager.
Judge Gerard Mullaly said Fisher “achieved a good deal as a sportsman and contributed to the community as part of that life”, but that this “deteriorated quickly” after he retired as his work plans collapsed in Covid and he increasingly moved in circles involving drugs.
He said he took into account the “very significant public shame” of his charges “given (his) success as a footballer” as he offered a sentence at the “lowest end of the appropriate range”.
Mr Dann said while Fisher was on bail, he had spoken publicly at The Good Blokes Society about his “downfall”.
Since his “fall from grace”, Mr Dann said Fisher had two options.
“One was sort of to give up, everyone knows I’ve been to jail, everyone knows I’ve been drug trafficking,” he said.
“Or he can do the opposite and rehabilitate, and that’s what he’s done.”
The court heard Fisher had been working nights on a rail network doing traffic control and that he’d “devoted himself to his redemption and rehabilitation”.
Meanwhile, Morvan, in WA, pleaded guilty in 2023 over the drugs and $129k in cash, and was jailed for six years, with a minimum of four years.
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