Switched On Gardener staff admit drug offences

Switched on Gardener. Photo / HBT

Two staff members at Christchurch's Switched On Gardener shop in the suburb of Linwood have admitted charges of supplying cannabis growing equipment.

They are the first of those arrested in Christchurch in the police's Operation Lime investigation to enter guilty pleas and be sentenced.

Raids on garden supply shops all over the country took place in late April.

"Both men were employed at Switched On Gardener to sell equipment for cannabis cultivation," crown prosecutor Claire Boshier told Christchurch District Court when the case was dealt with today.

Defence counsel Tim Fournier said Tarquinn Alex Home, 30, wanted to get the charge dealt with so that he could concentrate on caring for his terminally ill mother.

He had already been sentenced on other charges to a term of home detention, which was later substituted for 120 hours of community work in an appeal to the High Court.

Today he admitted a charge of supplying two bottles of nutrients and a book on indoor cannabis cultivation to an undercover policeman, knowing that the items were to be used for an offence under the Misuse of Drugs Act.

He had been approached in the store by the undercover officer asking about a bug that could be purchased and placed on cannabis plants to get rid of spider mites.

Judge Michael Radford convicted him and ordered him to do an extra 50 hours of community work.

Glenn Peter Kelly, 39, admitted charges of selling packs of nutrients and the book, and a growing lamp, at the shop.

He is already in prison serving a two-year sentence for other drug offences and Mr Fournier argued that he would have received no extra time if he had been sentenced on the Operation Lime charges at the same time.

Judge Radford agreed and sentenced him to a concurrent term of six months' jail, which should not extend his present term, which has a release date of July 20, 2011.

Other Christchurch people charged arising from the Operation Lime investigation and raids are due to appear at a pre-trial call-over on November 19.

- NZPA