Police allege evidence of money laundering
Police claim they found evidence of money laundering in the bank account of a 61-year-old Christchurch man accused of being involved in a drugs conspiracy involving party pills worth up to $240,000 on the streets.
The allegation was put to the jury as the Crown opened its case against Hugh James Robinson who denied seven drugs and firearm charges in the Christchurch District Court yesterday.
The Crown will call evidence from 37 witnesses in the trial before Judge Alistair Garland and a jury, which is expected to continue into next week.
Crown prosecutor Deidre Orchard said that when the police ended their Operation Nebraska surveillance operation in 2013, they searched several locations in Christchurch and the Wellington area, and made several arrests.
The locations in Christchurch included Robinson’s home in Riccarton, his car, his health product business in Carlyle Street, Sydenham, and a lock-up he rented in Russley Road. The class C drugs were found at each place, and a sawn-off shotgun and ammunition was found at the lock-up.
She said they found between 6000 and 8000 doses of party pills – benzyl piperazine, which was made illegal in 2008 – which had a street value of between $180,000 and $240,000. At a wholesale level, it would have been worth up to $56,000.
“In anybody’s language, that is a huge amount of money to have tied up in that drug. In the Crown’s submission it points to dealing,” said Mrs Orchard.
She said a police forensic accountant would give evidence of finding transactions “that bear all the hallmarks of money laundering” in Robinson’s bank account.
Sometimes, deposits were made at the same bank, at the same time, one at the counter and one at the bank’s drop box. Sometimes they were made at different banks, about the same time, for amounts around $10,000.
The implication was that the amounts were split to avoid the banks being obliged to report the deposits to the authorities.
“There was a lot of unexplained cash,” said Mrs Orchard.
Residue of BZP was found in a mixer and pill press at Robinson’s business, and pills that looked the same as the ones he had were found in the luggage of a man who had come to Christchurch from Wellington” and met Robinson.
She said the Crown’s case was circumstantial, but the jury would be able to safely draw inferences that he was engaged in producing the pills at his factory, for the purposes of supply. His son Jamie Robinson, 29, was also involved and Hugh Robinson said his son worked for him and was one of four people who had access to his business premises.
Mrs Orchard said Hugh Robinson must have known about the drugs and the firearm, which was found “in plain sight” in his storage unit. Jamie Robinson had also been seen visiting the storage unit.
The Crown case was that more than one person could be in possession of something. That was commonly the case in the type of situation the Crown was alleging.
Hugh Robinson told the police the BZP had been left over from the time the drug was made illegal in 2008. Before that date, he had been able to manufacture the pills legally.
After the Crown’s opening address, defence counsel Richard Maze said Robinson said the activities of the Wellington man who was found with BZP were “nothing to do with him”. The details about what the police had found were “largely uncontroversial”.
“The problem is the conclusion they have drawn from what they found,” said Mr Maze. This particularly applied to the evidence from the police’s financial expert, which is expected to be given on Wednesday.
Robinson denies charges of conspiracy to sell the class C drug BZP, four charges of possessing the drug for sale, and unlawful possession of the sawn-off shotgun and 115 twelve-gauge shotgun shells.
The trial is continuing.
Category: News
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