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Home / New Zealand

Head of Hawke's Bay meth ring pleads guilty

Hawkes Bay Today
14 Nov, 2019 02:00 AM2 mins to read

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The head of a Hawke's Bay meth ring pleaded guilty in Napier District Court on Thursday afternoon. Photo / File

The head of a Hawke's Bay meth ring pleaded guilty in Napier District Court on Thursday afternoon. Photo / File

A principal player in a Hawke's Bay methamphetamine ring has pleaded guilty to charges of possessing and supplying methamphetamine.

Roman Tua, 33, appeared in front of Judge Geoff Rea in the Napier District Court on Thursday afternoon.

He pleaded guilty to one charge of supplying methamphetamine and one charge of possessing methamphetamine for supply.

According to the summary of facts, Tua was the principal offender within the Hawke's Bay network.

He was responsible for either supplying, or possessing to supply, around 2.5kg of methamphetamine.

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READ MORE:
• Head of Hawke's Bay meth ring pleads guilty
• Hawke's Bay man bragged that his meth 'safe house' had $300,000 cash stash
• Historic sentence: Hawke's Bay meth addicts get home detention, first under new laws
• Premium - P in the post: Half a kilogram of meth delivered by courier to Napier man's door

Tua sourced the meth from both Auckland and Hamilton, purchasing the drug approximately once a month.

In late July 2018, while Tua was out of town reloading, a "safe house" was burgled with about $200,000 stolen.

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On one occasion, in September 2018, Tua travelled to Auckland with two accomplices, and purchased an unknown amount of product.

According to the summary of facts, he then discovered he had been cheated, with the product heavily "cut", unlike that which had been sampled.

He stayed in Auckland for two days to attempt to remedy the situation, but was unsuccessful.

Later, two other people attempted to "clean" the product, producing 309 grams of meth of unknown purity.

Discover more

New Zealand|crime

Hawke's Bay man bragged his meth 'safe house' had $300k cash stash

14 Nov 05:00 PM

On the last occasion on October 4, 2018, Tua bought 1kg of meth from Auckland.

On October 25, 2018, police seized 454.5g of product, and $274,265 in cash, found across several locations.

He has been remanded on bail for sentencing on February 12.

In total, there are eight defendants in the case, arrested as part of police Operation Chrome.

According to the summary of facts, police were able to retrieve text data back to April 2018, and were authorised to monitor certain phone numbers live.

The operation ended on October 25, 2018 with a number of addresses searched.

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The case was put on hold while the Court of Appeal reviewed the scale of available penalties.

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