Man sentenced for selling cannabis gear

 
The Southland Times

 
 
The sole Invercargill offender netted during the nationwide undercover police sting targeting the commercial sale of equipment for growing cannabis was sentenced to home detention yesterday.

Peter James Stewart, 50, appeared before Judge Kevin Phillips in the Invercargill District Court for sentence on five charges of supplying material or equipment capable of being used in the cultivation of cannabis from his store Europa Hydroponics.

He was sentenced to four months' home detention and 100 hours' community work.
The offending occurred between February 2009 and February 2010.
His charges included the supply of sodium light bulbs, Norml magazine, copies of a book titled Indoor Marijuana Horticulture and hydroponic equipment.
Judge Phillips said Stewart was caught in the police operation dubbed Operation Lime. The sting culminated in April when police swooped on 35 businesses across the country, including 16 branches of Switched On Gardener.
Stewart's business was making two or three sales a week but his own cannabis abuse got him into a position where he established connections with drug growers, he said.
He gave undercover agents advice on what equipment was needed to grow cannabis, how to set up hydroponic systems and how not to get caught, the judge said.
Stewart told police the sale of equipment and literature made up about 50 per cent of his business, Judge Phillips said.
But his business activities were in stark contrast with his personal life, where Stewart was a family man and not the kind of person who usually stood in the dock facing drugs charges, he said.
However, the deterrence and denouncement of drug offending must remain strong, he said.