A TREE-LOPPER who paid his six teenage employees with ecstasy, cannabis, alcohol and tobacco over a seven-month period has been jailed for at least six months.
Liam Dalton, 36, of O'Dowd Court, Port Fairy, yesterday pleaded guilty to several charges, including 10 counts of supplying either ecstasy or cannabis to minors, some as young as 13.
This included two counts of supplying ecstasy to a 17-year-old youth.
Dalton, who admitted drinking and smoking cannabis with the youths at various Warrnambool locations, believed he was acting as a "role model" and confidante to them.
The long-term drug user committed the offences while he was serving a community-based order for similar matters and Magistrate Jonathan Klestadt said it was "difficult to imagine a more egregious failure (to comply it)".
He sentenced Dalton to an 18-month jail term, with a six-month non-parole period and fined him $1750 on various drug charges and for breaching the order.
The Warrnambool Magistrates Court heard that on April 6, police searched a room at the Western Hotel on Kepler Street and found Dalton inside with three males aged 13, 14 and 17.
They seized more than 25 grams of cannabis plus two zip lock bags containing ecstasy, along with heroin and several bottles of spirits.
Four mobile phones were seized, containing text messages about supplying drugs, cigarettes and alcohol.
Between September 1 and April 6, Dalton admitted supplying cannabis on seven occasions to a 14-year-old boy, including: three times at the Western Hotel; once when he smoked it with the boy behind the Criterion Hotel; in the Fletcher Jones gardens; while driving around the CBD, and at a football oval.
He also admitted to smoking cannabis with the youths at Lake Pertobe, the same place he once gave them a slab of Cruiser pre-mixed drinks.
Defence counsel Catherine Parkes said her client acknowledged the seriousness of his offending and was remorseful that he had breached the trust of the parents who had agreed to let their children work for him.
The youths requested alcohol in exchange for their work which they did on a casual basis and foolishly Dalton agreed, she said.
Dalton left school in year nine when he was bullied and subjected to inappropriate sexual advances and touching by a priest, she added.
He started using cannabis when he was about 13, and by his early 20s was smoking large amounts.
Amphetamine entered his life at 15 and since then he has also used cocaine, LSD and heroin.
Since he was charged in April, Dalton has been undergoing drug counselling.
Mr Klestadt was incredulous when he read from a counsellors’ report in which Dalton said: “I think they (the youths) thought I was cool. I thought I was a bit of a role model.”
He also voiced scepticism about Dalton’s motivation for being in the hotel room with the boys when he had been living with his parents in Port Fairy.
Prosecutor Sergeant Sandra Skilton said the only acceptable penalty would be an immediate jail term.
“Children in society need protection from people like this,” she said.
Mr Klestadt said supplying illicit substances to the boys over a considerable period could only be regarded as significant criminal activity.
Dalton had done nothing but put the six youths onto the same path which had brought him before the court, he said.
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