Ex-chef delivery driving dealer jailed again for more ice trafficking

A former Sandy Bay restaurateur, whose business collapsed while he was in jail for dealing hundreds and thousands of dollars of meth, has been sent back to prison.

A METH-dealing Sandy Bay restaurateur who resumed his drug-delivery business only a month after being released from jail is now back behind bars.

Duc Van Nguyen, 36, was the chef and owner of Duc’s Asian Cuisine – a business that collapsed in 2017 while he was in prison for selling more than $200,000 of the drug ice.

After spending more than two years in jail, Nguyen was released on parole in January 2019, the Supreme Court of Tasmania heard on Monday.

READ THE ORIGINAL STORIES:

• Meth dealing chef busted a second time
• Asian eatery owner jailed for dealing dangerous drug
• User turned to dealing to pay drug debts

But the father-of-one breached his parole conditions after he was sprung driving with ice in his system, and was sent back to jail for a week in April that year.

Then in May, Nguyen started trafficking again – delivering drugs to customers throughout the greater Hobart area using his car.

Duc's Takeaway in Sandy Bay.

He was sprung only two months later and detained after police searched his home and found $7151 in “tainted” drug money.

Justice Michael Brett said Nguyen’s propensity to trafficking drugs seemed not to have been “affected or deterred” by his previous stint in jail.

He said Nguyen had pleaded guilty – to one count of trafficking and one count of dealing with proceeds of crime – at an early stage, and he accepted that indicated remorse.

“But your claim of remorse must be balanced against your persistence in offending,” Justice Brett said.

MORE NEWS:

• ‘Absolute joke’: Woman busted in sanctuary photo scam
• Second wave of restrictions could cost state $100M
• Front line workers deserve better than mistrust

“Your commission of this crime so soon after being released on parole in respect of a sentence for the same type of activity is a significant aggravating factor.”

Justice Brett noted Nguyen’s father had been murdered and two of his siblings died when he was a little boy, and that he and his mother were political refugees before arriving in Australia.

He also noted the new trafficking was “more limited” than his previous drug enterprise, and that Nguyen was relatively low in the hierarchy of distribution.

Nguyen was jailed for three years and six months, with a non-parole period of two years and three months.