Prison sentence for teen who boasted about selling drugs

Sunday 19 May 2024

A teenager who boasted about how much money he was making from selling drugs has been jailed for three-and-a-half years.

Killean Seamus Anthony Adams’s home was searched by Customs officers after they intercepted a package addressed to him which contained more than 200 ecstasy tablets.

During the search, they found cannabis, the class B drug ketamine, scales and a grinder bearing traces of drugs, and more than £500 in cash.

The Superior Number of the Royal Court – which sits for the most serious cases – heard that Adams committed the offences in May and June last year, when he was aged 18.

Crown Advocate Luke Sette, prosecuting, said that Adams’s mobile phone contained numerous text messages offering drugs for sale.

In one he boasted: “They’re making me a lot of money.”

Crown Advocate Sette described Adams as “a street-level dealer” and said the drugs could have fetched between £9,000 and £13,000.

Adams had pleaded guilty to importing drugs, offering to supply them and possessing them with intent to supply.

The court heard that he had nine previous convictions for offences including violence, dishonesty, and drug dealing.

He spent seven months in youth custody in the lead-up to this week's sentencing after failing to comply with a community service order, completing only 40 hours of a 180-hour sentence.

The Crown Advocate added: “He is at high risk of reconviction within the next 12 months and a risk of harm to others. He has said he would not complete a community service order.

"A non-custodial sentence cannot be justified.”

He recommended a sentence of four-and-half-years in youth custody.

Advocate Julia-Anne Dix, defending, called for a sentence of three years.

She said: “Mr Adams unequivocally accepts that he will receive a custodial sentence. He is resigned to his fate.”

However, she pointed out that her client was 18 at the time of the offences and had pleaded guilty to them at an earlier hearing in the Magistrate’s Court.

Advocate Dix added: “The fact that he was apprehended so quickly shows how unsophisticated this was.”

Deputy Bailiff Robert MacRae told Adams that custody was “the last resort for someone your age” and was only imposed if the offender was unwilling to undertake alternatives or the offences were particularly grave.

He said: “You have a history of failing to respond to non-custodial sentences. This is so serious that a non-custodial sentence cannot be justified.”

The Jurats sitting were Jane Ronge, Robert Christensen, David Le Heuzé, Alison Opfermann and Mike Berry.

Pictured top: Ecstasy tablets which Killean Adams attempted to import.