“Currently in New Zealand the best way to make money is to sell Methamphetamine.” Fighting the Demon explores the business of meth.
Patched Hells Angels member Brandon Cole was one of the people behind what might be the nation’s largest-ever successful meth import.
His arrest in July 2022 followed a year-long investigation, but authorities never found the meth stash.
Justice Andrew Becroft noted Cole’s significant role in the operation, despite his claims of being set up by a mysterious ‘Mr Big’ who he refused to name.
By the time Brandon St John Cole was arrested in July 2022, the 451kg of high-quality methamphetamine - with a street value ranging anywhere from $27 million to $100 million - had already dissipated into the community through the criminal underground market.
New Zealand law enforcement, operating off a tip from Australian authorities after a similar scheme overseas, was about a year too late to catch anyone red-handed with the stash.
But what they did find - including $2.4 million in cash stuffed into a West Auckland storage unit, a false wall at a North Shore factory and numbered plastic bags testing positive for meth residue - gave them enough evidence to charge Cole with importing methamphetamine, supplying methamphetamine and three counts of money laundering.
The 32-year-old Whenuapai resident faced a sentence of up to life imprisonment as he returned to the High Court at Auckland last week for sentencing, three months after his guilty pleas.
“Mr Cole, you do not need me to tell you that methamphetamine is an insidious, pernicious, and corrosive drug. It can and it does destroy lives and families,” Justice Andrew Becroft told the defendant. “You must know this better than most, given your own history of drug use ...
“The drugs, already distributed, will by now have caused incalculable social and economic harm and misery throughout New Zealand. The destructive ripple effect of this massive importation and distribution is probably still being felt today.”
That’s why, the judge said, he needed to send a strong message.
The New Zealand investigation, dubbed Operation Sampson, was launched after the Australian Border Force reported in August 2021 that a 556kg shipment of methamphetamine was discovered hidden inside a large “rotary separator” that had been airfreighted to Australia from the Philippines.
Justice Becroft noted that “rotary separator” appeared to be a misnomer - it was a made-up name for a non-functioning piece of heavy machinery made to look official enough to pass muster by Customs. And the ruse did work, at first.
A quick review by New Zealand Customs of past importations discovered that an almost identical shipment from the same exporter had been cleared to enter New Zealand two months earlier.
Hells Angels member Brandon St John Cole has pleaded guilty to multiple charges involving drug trafficking and money laundering. He was arrested after a yearlong investigation dubbed Operation Samson.
It was eventually traced back to Cole, who in retrospect had not exactly been discreet about the financial windfall that followed the importation.
He had paid nearly $32,000 cash for a 2020 model Harley-Davidson Softail Low Rider motorbike in September 2021 and paid $50,000 in rolled-up bills for an SUV with plates he changed to read OGBOSS.
Police traced an additional $877,640 that was laundered by giving cash to several businesses linked to co-defendants before the bulk of the money was allegedly transferred back into his account. Others have pleaded not guilty and await trial.
After launching the late investigation, police realised that Cole had signed a lease to rent a Silverdale factory in June 2021, seven days before the meth shipment arrived.
He then set up an email account under the alias John Adams and used it to communicate with the shipping agent as he waited for the rotary separator to be cleared by Customs. He left $10,000 cash in the shipping agent’s home letterbox to pay taxes and duty on the import. Once the construction equipment was cleared for release, Cole arranged to have it delivered to a Te Atatū South business before being transferred again to the Silverdale factory space.
Police don’t know exactly how much drugs were hidden inside the machinery when it was dismantled. But they knew from the seized Australian import that the drugs were shipped in individually numbered bags containing 1kg of meth each. Of the roughly 20 empty bags remaining at the Silverdale factory when police searched it, the highest number was 451, hence the 451kg figure. Cole agreed to the amount as part of his guilty plea.
Mastermind or minion?
Despite his “boss” licence plate seeming to boast otherwise, Cole insisted even after his guilty plea that he wasn’t actually the leader of the illicit enterprise.
“It is reported that you became involved in the offending through a close friend, whom you describe as the mastermind of the operation,” Justice Becroft noted of the defendant’s claim. “You have refused to name that person; you claim out of fear for your safety and that of your family. You say that as a struggling addict, you entered into an agreement with that unnamed person to provide an address to store the methamphetamine and became involved.”
Prosecutor Conrad Purdon disputed Cole’s description of his role, at first calling the defendant the “principal architect of the import”. He later dialled back the terminology at the urging of the judge. Regardless, Purdon said, Cole should be considered to have had a “leader” role rather than a “significant” role.
Both terms have legal connotations, with the longest sentences reserved for defendants deemed to be in leadership roles.
The distinction was so important that an earlier sentencing hearing for Cole had been postponed so that lawyers could try to find more middle ground.
“It’s crucial because life imprisonment is at stake,” the judge said at the earlier hearing.
While it was difficult to reconstruct a drug operation a year after the drugs have been sold, some very strong inferences could be made, Purdon argued. For instance, he said, no one earned almost $3.5 million - a figure obtained by adding up Cole’s cash, the vehicles he bought and the laundered money - unless they are very high in the hierarchy.
Police found $2.4 million in cash inside a West Auckland storage unit leased to Brandon Cole. Photo / Supplied
Purdon also pointed out that Cole already had a distribution network at the ready through the Hells Angels, who he said were “most certainly” involved. The judge asked where the evidence of that was, and Purdon again said it was an inference.
“This is such a significant amount of methamphetamine, it does need supply lines to be supplied,” Purdon replied. “You’re going to go to the people who you are a member of their group.”
Defence lawyer John Munro disagreed, arguing that the judge could only sentence his client based on what was agreed to in the summary of facts - not inferences. And Cole’s involvement was not mentioned in the summary of facts after breaking down the rotary separator, he said.
Munro acknowledged his client was “the man on the ground in New Zealand” but said there were others above him who served as the “masterminds”. There was no evidence he went to the Philippines to arrange the import, he said.
Cole certainly got paid for his efforts - reflective of the $3.5 million outlined in the summary of facts - but a kingpin would have received a much higher profit, he said.
The defendant took the matter even further in a report that was prepared prior to his sentencing. He said the $2.5 million cash found in the Kumeu storage unit was never his to spend. He said he was holding it for the kingpin, who he again refused to name.
The prosecutor rubbished the pre-sentencing interview, stating that Cole “disagreed with so many things” he had already admitted to in the summary of facts that “his word is effectively worthless”.
“These are incontrovertible facts,” Purdon said of the summary.
Cole’s own lawyer dismissed his client’s revised claims, explaining to the judge that they didn’t ultimately wish to contradict what was agreed to in the summary of facts.
Who is Mr Big?
Justice Becroft was also sceptical of Cole’s suggestion that he was merely storing the drugs and got in over his head.
“With respect, I do not believe that view bears scrutiny,” he said. “You were fully aware of what you were doing and you knowingly succumbed to temptation for huge financial gain.”
But the judge declined the Crown’s suggestion that Cole receive a life sentence, instead adopting the defence’s proposed starting point of 33 years.
“In my view, given the evidential difficulties in ‘constructing’ your role, a year after the offending, I must take a cautious approach in assessing the part you played,” he explained.
“Where the evidence is uncertain, you must effectively receive the benefit of the doubt. But you had an important, if not vital, role in both the importation and the supply. I assess your role as being at the top end ‘significant’ shading in and slightly overlapping with a low-end ‘leading’ role. To assess your role as being any higher, as the Crown wishes me to do, would be speculation and guesswork.”
At the least, the judge said, Cole “had a clear management function in the operational aspects of the New Zealand end of the importation”. But that doesn’t necessarily equate, he said, to “Mr Big”.
Brandon Cole pleaded guilty to substantial money laundering in addition to the 451kg methamphetamine import. Photo / Supplied
He added two years to the 33-year starting point to account for the money-laundering operation before considering potential sentence reductions.
The defence had sought reductions totalling 70%, which the judge described as “totally unrealistic”. But he did allow 20% for his guilty pleas, 5% for the effect on his children and struggles he will have in prison due to mental health and 10% for drug addiction and prospects for rehabilitation.
Cole had moved to New Zealand from South Africa at age 14 and began using drugs at a young age, according to a report provided to the court. His drug use appeared at first to be an attempt to “self-manage” ADHD, the judge said, noting that the condition was poorly understood in South Africa at the time resulting in Cole being inadequately and wrongly medicated.
He went on to struggle profoundly with substance abuse at times, including at one point having suffered a cocaine-induced heart attack, Becroft explained.
The defendant has also struggled with depression, the judge noted.
‘You knew what you were doing’
Cole’s lawyer had sought an additional 15% reduction for previous good character, pointing to his lack of a criminal record. The Crown, however, noted that the offending lasted for about a year and argued that patched gang membership should negate such a discount.
The judge agreed
“All the letters [submitted to the court by the defence] speak of a person who is quick to help and support others,” Justice Becroft said. “They say that this offending does not reflect who you are as a person. Your family also describe you as a loving and devoted father to your two young daughters. The overwhelming theme in all your testimonials is that your offending does not reflect what your family and friends know about you as a person.
“But you did commit yourself to this offending. You obtained vast amounts — millions of dollars of cash. And you did know exactly what you were doing.”
The judge also sided with the Crown in its request that Cole be ordered to serve at least 10 years of the 22-year sentence before he can begin to apply for parole.
“I cannot see too much that would in any way represent significant mitigation or vulnerability that would explain your offending,” he explained. “You are not a young man, and while you appear to have come to your senses and that is positive, you must have known the enormity of the calculated risk you were running.
“Accordingly, in this case, I accept that the principles of deterrence, and denunciation must win out, and together with accountability, necessitate the imposition of a minimum period of imprisonment.”
Craig Kapitan is an Auckland-based journalist covering courts and justice. He joined the Herald in 2021 and has reported on courts since 2002 in three newsrooms in the US and New Zealand.
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