Townsville District Court: Luke Robert Scholze jailed after being found guilty of laundering $270k, investing in cryptocurrency

A judge has described the downfall of a former mechanic as ‘tragic’ after he was found guilty of commercially selling more than a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of drugs and funnelling it into bitcoin.

The trial for Luke Robert Scholze will resume on Monday in Townsville District Court.

A father who was described in court as a hardworking man, formerly running a number of motor businesses in Townsville will spend more than a year in jail after dealing drugs and investing the money into cryptocurrency.

Luke Robert Scholze was found guilty by a jury of one count of dealing with money or other property proceeds of crime by laundering more than $100,000, after crown prosecutor Sam Bain alleged the man was commercially selling marijuana and investing the funds into bitcoin in 2020.

The father of two was sentenced by Judge Michael Coker on February 6 with his wife, father and other family members sitting at the back of court.

In addition to being found guilty of money laundering, he pleaded guilty to one count of possessing dangerous drugs.

He was sentenced to four years’ jail with a non-parole period of 18 months.

Defence barrister Anthony Kimmins argued that despite the crown having alleged Scholze dealt with $270,000 in commercially sold drugs before funnelling it into bitcoin, the judge could not be sure the total amount was gained unlawfully.

He flagged several instances where Scholze had purchased and sold cars for people that were handled in cash only.

Mr Kimmins also emphasised the man’s lack of criminal history and his hardworking nature prior to trial.

“(Scholze) is a person capable of hard work and has maintained employment since a young age,” he said.

“There’s no reason he won’t be able to return to that type of work when he’s out of prison.”

Judge Coker said acknowledged that not all of the funds gained by Scholze in the offending period would have been gained from dealing drugs.

“It’s not clear where all the money came from with invoices and cash jobs,” he said.

He told the court when sentencing the man he would define the quantum sum of dealings as $150,000.

“It is indeed tragic you come before the court at this stage of your life with these particular consequences,” Mr Coker said during the sentence.

In this file photo taken on January 27, 2020 a physical imitation of a Bitcoin (Photo by INA FASSBENDER / AFP)

Throughout the course of the trial which was seen before 12 jury members, the man maintained that the great sums of money he had acquired was due to ‘cash jobs’ linked to his work with cars when he owned Blacklist Performance and NQ Mechanical and Tyre Solutions.

The court was also told he often dealt with ‘cashies’ due to trying to ‘avoid the tax man’.

Mr Bain alleged the 51-year-old man had been supplying marijuana from April 2020 to August 2020 and then used the money to invest in bitcoin.

During the trial, Mr Bain submitted screenshots to the court of a conversation on the app ‘Wickr’ which he said proved Scholze was selling drugs.

One of the messages that was sent to someone called ‘Boss Coin’, read ‘Hey man, that sh-t that came last week can’t sell bro, full of seed’.

And in another message, it read ‘If that stuff is the same coming I’ll send it back as I can’t sell it’.

Scholze who chose to provide evidence, was asked about the messages when he took to the stand and he referred to the conversation as simply ‘Talking sh-t’.

Mr Bain told the jury while he was aware ‘cashies’ were a common transaction in the mechanics industry, there were still a lot of unknown cash deposits.

“There was significant unexplained monies over this period of time,” Mr Bain said.

“Over $270,000 in less than six months, and we know it didn’t come from savings.”

Mr Bain said the man’s business “sadly” had the characteristics of one that wasn’t succeeding, and couldn’t possibly have brought in that much money in that short time frame.

The trial for Luke Robert Scholze who has been charged with dealing with money or other property proceeds of crime by laundering more than $100,000 will resume Monday.

“There was a decline in sales in June 2020, his dad was lending him money and the business did close in January 2021,” he said.

“Months after, he got a job in the mines.”

Scholze took the stand himself and admitted to investing in bitcoin in the past, however, claimed he stopped from October 6 in 2020.

Defence barrister Anthony Kimmens called upon three witnesses in the last day of the trial, which included two people who had bought cars and vehicle parts from Scholze, as well as his father Mark Scholze who claimed to have loaned his son money at separate times, as well as paid his son to do work on cars, in the sum of up to $59,820.

Mr Kimmens said after totalling Scholze’s invoices, along with the cash jobs he completed his total income was $296,443.65 which was more than the alleged amount of money that the crown was attempting to prove was made during that period.

“(Scholez) is a simple man,” Mr Kimmens said.

“He’s good at something, finding things to fix and sell and made a go of it.”

Other witnesses who were called upon throughout the trial included detectives involved in the investigation and an accountant who analysed Scholze’s bank statements.

Scholze nodded his head as the guilty verdict was handed down, and looked to his wife who was in the public gallery in support of him, as she dropped her head and cried.

Originally published as Townsville District Court: Luke Robert Scholze jailed after being found guilty of laundering $270k, investing in cryptocurrency