Matthew Jamieson, Robert Duke jailed after $750K NT meth bust

Two South Australian men will spend years behind bars in the Territory after being busted with hundreds of thousands of dollars of methamphetamine. See how they tried to cart it into the NT.

Two men will spend years behind bars over their roles in a South Australian drug syndicate carting hundreds of thousands of dollars of “dangerous” methamphetamine into the Northern Territory.

Earlier this year, Matthew Jamieson and Robert Duke pleaded guilty in the Supreme Court to a number of charges related to the supply of commercial amounts of methamphetamine into the Territory after their handover was intercepted.

Detectives from the Territory’s Drug and Organised Crime Squad arrested the pair in February after meeting to exchange almost half a kilogram of methamphetamine for more than $100,000 in cash.

The cash, the court heard when the men were sentenced in September and November, was the proceeds of Duke selling methamphetamine in the Darwin area and was payment for more drugs to be transported from SA.

Matthew Jamieson and Robert Duke were jailed after supplying “dangerous” methamphetamines into the Northern Territory.

The court heard Duke, who lived in Adelaide at the time of his arrest, travelled to Darwin on February 12 before renting an Airbnb in Parap.

On February 22, Jamieson, a truck driver who also lived in Adelaide, left for Darwin with 496g of methamphetamine inside the cab of a Mack prime mover.

On February 24, detectives intercepted the pair, who the court heard were persons of interest in the supply of methamphetamine into the Territory, at the Hudson Apartment Hotel Berrimah where they were arrested.

Police seized the methamphetamine, which the court heard was worth up to $744,000 if sold by the gram in the greater Darwin area, $110,550 in cash and the pair’s encrypted phones.

Duke’s Airbnbn was searched and police found another six grams of methamphetamine, 22g of cannabis, a vacuum seal machine, digital scales, another encrypted phone and a mobile phone with two SIM cards.

In sentencing in September, Justice Stephen Southwood said Jamieson “played an integral part” in importing the drugs into the Territory.

“Without such couriers, such drugs cannot be brought into the Territory,” he said.

When Duke was sentenced in November, the court heard his involvement in the syndicate was to pay off a $40,000 gambling and drug debt.

Justice Southwood said Duke also played an “integral part” in the drug supply.

“The offender was caught red-handed,” he said.

Jamieson was sentenced to four years jail for supplying a dangerous drug in a commercial quality, with one and a half years suspended, backdated to February 24.

After being released he must return to South Australia and not reenter the NT for 18 months.

Duke was sentenced to six years jail, with a non-parole period of four and a half years, for charges including supplying a dangerous drug in a commercial quantity and possessing a trafficable quantity of a dangerous drug.

His sentence was backdated to February 24.

Originally published as Matthew Jamieson, Robert Duke jailed after $750K NT meth bust