Darwin drug criminal booted back to Greece after fleeing police raid on pushbike

A Darwin man who tried to flee a police raid on his house on a pushbike has been booted back to Greece for four years after being busted with drugs and weapons.

Police were preparing to raid Michael Kalitsis’s shed when he emerged on a mountain bike and then “rode towards them and took off”.

A DARWIN man who tried to flee a police raid on his house on a pushbike has been booted back to Greece for four years after being busted with drugs and weapons.

Michael Kalitsis, 39, pleaded guilty in the Supreme Court to supplying less than a commercial quantity of methamphetamine as well as possessing a precursor to the drug and an illegal weapon.

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The court heard Kalitsis was storing 520 pseudoephedrine tablets in his shed which were intended to be used to make meth and which he planned to swap for drugs to feed his own habit.

On January 3, police were preparing to raid the shed when Kalitsis emerged on a mountain bike and then “rode towards them and took off”.

As he fled, Kalitsis tried to throw away a clip seal bag containing 1.87g of meth before the officers chased him down and caught him.

In sentencing, Justice Judith Kelly said when the raid went ahead, police found ice pipes and a “knuckleduster with taser capacity” which “worries me” due to his lengthy criminal history.

“So you have a 12-page criminal history, which includes a number of miscellaneous offences as well as a large number of driving offences, many of them for driving with a prohibited drug in your system — nine convictions for possessing and carrying unlawful weapons and a total of 33 drug-related convictions,” she said.

“Some for possession, some for supply, you also have multiple convictions for breaching court orders.”

In ordering Kalitsis back to his native Greece, Justice Kelly said he had moved to Darwin in 1997 and had a very supportive family who now wanted him to go back home.

“Your family describe you in references as generous to family and always trying to help but then you just get on the drugs and fall off the radar,” she said.

“They say you have been making an effort to turn your life around. They thought you were succeeding but unfortunately, you were not.”

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Justice Kelly sentenced Kalitsis to two years in jail, suspended immediately on the condition he return to Greece and not come back to the NT for four years.

“Mr Kalitsis, I really do wish you the best in dealing with this dreadful problem and your future life for the next four years in Greece — and I hope the National Service works out,” she said.

Justice Kelly queried whether she could banish Kalitsis from the whole of Australia but his lawyer, Peter Maley, said the court’s jurisdiction didn’t allow a broader ban.