KEY POINTS:
A 30-year-old says he was under pressure to allow his rented home to be used for the P manufacturing operation that brought him a three year jail term today.
Christchurch High Court Justice John Fogarty accepted the explanation from Benn Francis Millward, but said he could not pass
a light sentence "because of a person being strong-armed into doing something", the Court New website reported today.
However, he thought there should be some way of helping people like Millward, and his partner 26-year-old Desiree Antonia Bastiaanse, who had two children, and felt vulnerable to threats.
"There ought to be opportunities within the legal system whereby this can be reported and steps taken for a person to be removed from the threat."
Defence counsel David Ruth said the couple's landlord had very strong gang connections.
His name had been given to police but he had refused to make a statement and the matter was being taken no further.
"It seems to me that people in their position with young children are awfully vulnerable.
"The immediate threat is of more moment to them than witness protection which inevitably means moving out of Christchurch, and New Zealand is probably too small for a witness protection programme to give someone some comfort," Mr Ruth said.
Millward had pleaded guilty to a charge of manufacturing methamphetamine and two charges of wilfully illtreating two children by having them living at the property where the dangerous P lab was set up.
Bastiaanse admitted a charge of permitting premises to be used for methamphetamine manufacture.
Prosecutor Kathy Bell said the crown was concerned the manufacturing had been done in a room close to the children's bedroom, which was accessible to the children.
She said the crown had no evidence of Millward being "strong-armed".
But Justice Fogarty said: "There seems to be a pattern (in the drug world) that the most dangerous and evil of people escape detection."
He had heard of other cases where organised criminal elements would pressure vulnerable people into providing facilities, which therefore gave them protection when a P lab was detected.
Since the guilty pleas, Bastiaanse has given birth to a third child on November 28.
"It is really a crying shame to see a young couple like you being sentenced when you both clearly have the ability to make good lives for yourselves outside the criminal world," Justice Fogarty said.
He said it was unfortunate that a man of Millward's ability and obvious intelligence - he had done two years of tertiary studies - had got himself into this position.
He jailed Millward for three years and imposed six months home detention on Bastiaanse.
- NZPA
