A former award-winning real estate agent turned large-scale P dealer has been jailed for more than nine years.
Brett Campbell Bogue, 44, pleaded guilty to six charges covering class-A drug offending and unlawful possession of a pistol and was sentenced in the High Court at Auckland today.
He was snared in a police investigation dubbed Operation Enzone, which caught him dealing methamphetamine worth about $750,000 in Auckland, Northland and Napier over three and a half months in 2012.
The methamphetamine was manufactured by Frank William Murray, 45, at a farm in Herekino, in the Far North.
That was where $100,000 was found buried in a rusty ammunition tin hidden in thick undergrowth, when police executed search warrants.
The High Court in Auckland heard today that Bogue had only a minor misdemeanour on his criminal record and his offending had started after being introduced to the drug by friends three years ago.
His lawyer Ron Mansfield accepted there was an element of commerciality to his crimes but it was driven by his addiction.
Bogue achieved success as a real estate agent for Ray White and had led a "respectable and productive life" until he got hooked on P, Mr Mansfield said.
But police intercepted communications between July and October 2012 showed the offender had diverted his attention from selling houses to selling meth.
During the period, he supplied or offered to supply 755gm and the Crown said the dealing was aggravated by the fact he also supplied 10 litres of hypophosphorous acid to Murray – enough to produce more than 9kg of methamphetamine.
Also sentenced this morning was Bogue's "lieutenant in training" Marcus Christian Lean, 28, who previously pleaded guilty to a charge of supplying methamphetamine, which came from two occasions when he accompanied his co-offender on drug deals.
Unlike Bogue, the former Clevedon roofer could not rely on a clean record, with past convictions for minor drug possession, driving offences and firearms crime.
He was jailed for four years two months.
Murray, who was found to have manufactured more than $2 million of methamphetamine over a four-year period was jailed for 19 years earlier this year.
He will serve at least nine and a half before being eligible for parole.
