A Dunedin man who used the prison telephone to try to arrange placing blame for a pending drug possession on someone else has been given a 20-month sentence.
Kayne Daltow William Joseph was sentenced for possession of ecstasy for supply, conspiracy to defeat the course of justice and conspiracy to assault with intent to injure when he appeared in Invercargill District Court on Tuesday.
The court heard Joseph was arrested in April last year following a search of his partner's house at Derwent Cres, Invercargill, where police found him in possession of 15.1g of MDMA, which had a street value of about $3000.
He was remanded in custody at Invercargill Prison, where he made several phone calls to his partner.
Using the prison telephone, he hatched a plan with his partner to arrange for another person to say the drugs did not belong to Joseph, but to that other person.
It was during these phone calls from prison to a friend, who was with his partner at the time, that Joseph also requested his friend assault another person.
Judge Bernadette Farnan sentenced Joseph to 20 months for the drug possession, six months for conspiracy to assault and nine months for attempting to pervert the course of justice, all to be served concurrently.
