Te-Maipi Adams showed the girls how to smoke methamphetamine using a glass pipe. File photo / NZME
A drug addict plied two girls with alcohol, cannabis and methamphetamine, even after one of them told him she was only 12. He said was it was OK as long as she didn’t tell anyone.
The other girl was 14. Neither of them knew Te-Maipi Adams, 42, when they went to his house on September 15 last year.
They were given not only cannabis, but also alcohol, including straight vodka, and taught how to smoke methamphetamine using a glass pipe.
Adams was jailed for two years and three months when he appeared in the Dunedin District Court in June after pleading guilty to three charges of supplying a Class C controlled drug to a person under 18 and two of supplying a Class A drug.
He appealed to the High Court against his sentence, on the grounds that it was “manifestly excessive”. That appeal has now been dismissed.
The High Court decision from Justice Rachel Dunningham said the older girl, called Victim R in court documents, went to his home about 11am that day looking for cannabis.
Adams heated a small amount of the drug on knives and allowed her to inhale it through a plastic funnel.
Later that day, Victim R returned with the younger girl, Victim C.
Adams prepared cannabis for them to inhale and gave them a can of Woodstock bourbon and coke mix to share.
Victim C told Adams she was only 12, but he replied that it was OK if she did not tell anyone.
Adams then went to a bottle store to buy alcohol.
“Once he returned, he encouraged both victims to drink straight vodka and held the bottle up while they were drinking,” Justice Dunningham said.
Adams put a small amount of methamphetamine into a glass pipe and demonstrated how to smoke it.
“He held the pipe to the victims’ mouths and applied the flame, causing them to inhale the smoke,” the judge said.
“He did this for both victims a number of times. R was holding C’s hand while she inhaled the methamphetamine.
“When they were done, the appellant placed the end of the straw into the bag and into victim C’s mouth, telling her to suck out the powder.
“The victims were then given more alcohol.”
About 5pm, six hours after R first went to the house, they made an excuse to leave. C was unable to walk without R’s help.
Police were contacted at 7pm and found both girls in a “severely intoxicated” and agitated state. They were taken to hospital and kept overnight under sedation.
Adams’ counsel, Sarah Saunderson-Warner, told the High Court in Dunedin that this was a “one-off supply involving very small quantities of methamphetamine with no commercial element”.
She accepted that the victims were particularly young and vulnerable and that harm was caused.
However, Adams had never met the pair, had not assumed any responsibility in relation to them and there was no breach of trust.
Saunderson-Warner said Adams had a prolonged addiction to substances and had a traumatic upbringing.
He was not attempting to stupefy the victims or offend against them in other ways.
“It was just an entirely wrong-headed decision by an addicted user,” she said.
Justice Dunningham said that, while the quantity of drugs involved was small, Adams’ culpability was significant.
“Both the victims were young, and in the case of the supply to the 12-year-old, Mr Adams knew she was 12, but this did not dissuade him. I consider this is a seriously aggravating factor.
“While there is no significant breach of trust here as Mr Adams was not, for example, a teacher or family member, there is a modest element of breach of trust whenever an adult has unsupervised children in their presence and offends against them as here.”
Justice Dunningham dismissed Adams’ appeal against his sentence.
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