Man caught with €400k of cannabis to be jailed after State appeals suspended sentence

By Ryan Dunne

A Laois man caught with close to €400,000 of cannabis will serve two and a half years in prison, after the Court of Appeal upheld the State’s argument that the original fully suspended sentence imposed was unduly lenient.

Jason Tuthill (51) lowered his head and wept as Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy on Wednesday quashed his original sentence of three years, fully suspended, and resentenced him to five years, with the final two and a half years suspended.

Ms Justice Kennedy said that while there were mitigating factors in the case, including the fact that Tuthill and his family had been threatened after he failed to pay back a debt, the court did not accept that this justified the sentencing judge in reducing the headline sentence of eight years to three years before fully suspending it.

Tuthill, of Barrowhouse, Co Laois, was convicted under Section 15a of the Misuse of Drugs Act after pleading guilty to having 17kgs of cannabis and three kilos of cannabis herb at AutoChem, Unit 9, Block F, Athy Business Campus on April 27th, 2023.

He was sentenced at Naas Courthouse by Judge Terrence O’Sullivan in May last year to three years, fully suspended.

In launching an appeal against the undue leniency of this sentence, counsel for the Director of Public Prosecutions, Daniel Boland BL, said there was nothing exceptional about the mitigating factors in this case. However, he said Judge O'Sullivan had suspended the sentence in its entirety for five years, which the DPP submitted was unduly lenient.

Mr Boland said there had been very good testimonials handed in on behalf of Tuthill, including one from a garda, but counsel submitted that these were not impressive enough to justify the reduction.

Mr Boland also acknowledged that the respondent had entered an early guilty plea, but he pointed out that Tuthill was “caught red-handed" with the drugs.

While the respondent had no previous convictions, Mr Boland said that, nevertheless, the reduction from the headline sentence of eight to three years seemed “enormous”. Mr Boland said that this “massive reduction” was unwarranted, adding that the respondent should be serving a custodial sentence as he was caught with €400,000 of drugs.

Counsel for the respondent, Damien Colgan SC, said that the sentencing judge had decided the matter based on the circumstances of Tuthill’s own life. Counsel said that the respondent previously had a company before he fell on hard times during Covid, and then “a person came with an offer” for him.

To this, Ms Justice Kennedy said that this case stemmed from the appellant’s own actions, which featured “a massive error of judgment on his part”.

Mr Colgan said that serious threats had been made against Tuthill, so there was room for the sentencing judge to deviate from the mandatory minimum sentence.

Counsel said that the respondent had fully cooperated and made full admissions to the gardaí. He said that the person who made threats against Tuthill was aware of his workplace and his wife’s workplace, so the respondent was terrified of this person.

Mr Colgan said that while the respondent did know that a parcel was coming containing an illegal substance, he didn’t know about the volume of the drugs.

In delivering the court’s judgement, Ms Justice Kennedy noted that this case involved 20 kilos of cannabis worth an estimated €399,470. She said that it was clear that the value of the drugs was considerable, while the evidence placed Tuthill at a very low level of culpability.

Ms Justice Kennedy said that the court considered the reduction from the headline sentence of eight years to three years to be excessive, adding that while there was mitigation in this case, it did not justify such a reduction.

Ruling that it was an error in principle for the sentencing judge to fully suspend the sentence due to a desire to allow Tuthill to continue in the community, Ms Justice Kennedy said the court would quash the sentence and resentence the respondent.

Accordingly, the court set a headline sentence of eight years, reduced to five years, with the final two and a half years of that sentence suspended.