Fear and debt forced man into drug dealing

Saturday 23 September 2017

A thirty-year-old man who got his nephew to help him try and con drugs users by selling them drugs the duo didn’t have or were duds, has told the Royal Court he did it because he feared for his safety.

Michael Gilbraith – a regular cannabis user – said his habit, and other events – led to his being trapped in a debt spiral.

When the police arrested him on suspicion of dealing in August 2016 he told them: “If I didn’t owe money, I wouldn’t be doing this”.

In court it was claimed Gilbraith owed dealers £2,800 and was facing ‘interest’ of £150 a week. To try and pay it off, he bought a kilo of cannabis for £1,200 which he hoped to sell on at a profit. But, when his home was burgled and the cannabis stolen, he was forced into a position of having to buy yet another kilo to pay off what he owed for the first.

Galbraith also enlisted his 22-year-old nephew, Dylan Rawlinson, to try and sell drugs they didn’t have and ‘dried out’ LSD tabs to unsuspecting clients.

According to his lawyer, Advocate Sue Pearmain, Galbraith found himself in ‘a desperate situation’ and was living in fear because he was being threatened by those he owed money to.

The Crown described the offences as serious and asked for a 12-month prison sentence for Gilbraith and 150 hours community service for Rawlinson. But, passing sentence Royal Court Commissioner Julian Clyde-Smith said whilst the court agreed with the sentence for Rawlinson, Gilbraith’s “exceptional family circumstances” made a non-custodial sentence more appropriate, and handed down 180 hours community service.