Repeat offender caught with $170,000 meth stash after motorcycle stop, jail time

A dealer who was caught with almost 200 grams of methylamphetamine worth up to $170,000 after being stopped while riding his motorcycle has been sentenced to almost three years in prison.

Huon Gendall, 32, pleaded guilty in the Supreme Court of Tasmania to trafficking in a controlled substance and dealing with the proceeds of crime.

The court heard Gendall was stopped by police in the Huon Valley on June 25, 2023, after his driving “attracted the attention” of a number of officers.

Police saw him try to throw away his phone, which they later seized, along with a backpack containing $1,145 in cash and 59 individual snaplock bags filled with methylamphetamine totaling 170.3 grams.

A subsequent search of his home found digital scales with traces of the illegal drug, electronic scales, spare snaplock bags, a metal spoon and three more bags of the drug, weighing a total of 8.48 grams.

The court heard that Gendall’s life had been ‘substantially affected’ by illicit drug use since his early 20s and that he had been convicted of possession offenses since 2014.

In 2018, he received a six-month suspended sentence for drug-related charges, including selling and possessing a controlled substance and driving with a controlled drug in his blood.

Despite this, Gendall continued to offend and was convicted in 2019 of trafficking methylamphetamine and other drugs.

He was given a drug treatment order with a two-year parole, but breached the conditions and served 11 months of a two-year sentence.

Judge Robert Pearce said the current crime was committed within nine months of his release and he started using drugs again.

He noted that some of the methylamphetamine in his possession was for his own use, but the rest was intended for sale.

“You’re saying it was to fund your own addiction,” he said.

“Nevertheless, the individual bags found in your possession indicate that you intended to make a significant number of sales in a substantial aggregate quantity and of a significant value.”

Judge Pearce said Gendall’s offending was “not isolated or out of character” and he was on bail for other offenses at the time.

He said that while his guilty plea was in his favor, it was “an admission of the inevitable.”

“It is an aggravating circumstance that you were on bail for other offenses at the time, even though those offenses have yet to be dealt with,” he said.

“You express a desire, with the help of your new partner, to make new attempts to overcome your addiction and remove yourself from your drug and criminal relationships.”

“All prospects for rehabilitation are not lost.”

Judge Pearce sentenced Gendall to two years and nine months in prison, with a non-parole period of one year and four and a half months.

He ordered the forfeiture of various items seized by police, including the drugs, scales and cash, to the state.