Bodybuilder’s drug importing convictions will stand
Drug importing convictions will stand against a high profile Christchurch bodybuilder and personal trainer who now faces a doubtful future in his chosen career.
Christchurch District Court Judge Gary MacAskill said sports stars – even those at elite level – could expect no special treatment from the courts if they committed serious criminal offences.
Twenty-four-year-old Stephen Michael Raymond Orton had asked for a discharge without conviction after he admitted being a “catcher” for two packages of the class C drug methylone which were sent from the firm in China. The drug mimicks the effects of ecstasy.
Judge MacAskill refused the discharge, telling Orton: “The lesson for you and others to learn is that if you commit serious criminal offending you will suffer the consequences.”
For Orton, those consequences were a sentence of seven months of home detention and 150 hours of community work “as a repayment for the community”, said the judge.
Sentencing submissions were heard yesterday but the judge adjourned the case for 24 hours to allow him to consider the issues, and reports of other similar cases.
He said the drug packages had been intercepted in Auckland and sent on as controlled deliveries to a fictitious woman at Orton’s address. The total amount was 709g which could have had a value of between $42,552 and $94,560, depending how it was sold.
He accepted that although Orton had agreed to receive the drug for a payment of $500 and then leave it on his porch for collection, he had not arranged for its importation and was not involved in on-selling it. Orton said he had not received the payment.
He acknowledged that Orton previously had a good character and had reached high levels in his bodybuilding sport. He was likely to lose his job as a personal trainer, and was likely to lose clients. But he saw that as a result of publicity about him involving himself in drug offences, rather than the convictions themselves.
He accepted that the convictions would “probably prejudice” Orton’s ability to travel to overseas bodybuilding events. “There is a more important consideration. The offending is so serious that the court should not be in a position of concealing it from border authorities in other countries.”
The judge then refused to grant the discharge without conviction, and imposed the home detention sentence which will be served without special conditions or post detention conditions. Probation sees Orton as having no rehabilitation needs.
Category: News
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