A heroin courier caught trafficking the drug to Dundee has been jailed for four years – after a sheriff told him dealers like him carry the can for the high number of people killed by drugs in the city last year.
Garry O’Prey was handed the sentence as new figures emerged showing drugs rates in the city are far in excess of anywhere else in the country.
A sheriff told O’Prey that they were running at twice the national average – and that the “rate of drug deaths related to the drug is a relevant factor” in sentencing dealers.
New figures revealed that 72 people in Dundee lost their lives to drugs in the last 12 months – more than double the number in 2016 and more than five times the number that died from drugs in 1999.
O’Prey was snared driving on the outskirts of Dundee with his girlfriend and their child in the car.
When pulled over by police acting on a tip-off he immediately said: “It has nothing to do with her or the wee one – I’m going away for a long time for this.”
Fiscal depute Charmaine Gilmartin told Dundee Sheriff Court that more than half a kilo of heroin – at almost twice the normal purity level found on the streets – was found in the car.
She added: “The drugs recovered would have had an as seen value of between £9,000 and £13,500.”
O’Prey, 29, a prisoner at HMP Perth, pleaded guilty on indictment to being concerned in the supply of heroin on February 15 this year on the A90 Perth to Dundee road.
Defence solicitor Neal McShane said: “He is aware the outcome here will be a lengthy prison sentence. He had been released from prison and was working but lost that employment.
“Having previously been in prison he knows persons involved in crime.
“This proposal was put to him – he was to be paid £500 – and he foolishly accepted it.
“He let himself, his partner and his child down.”
Sheriff Alastair Brown jailed O’Prey for four years – and said it would have been six had he not pleaded guilty at the first opportunity.
He said: “According to figures I’ve seen recently drug deaths in Dundee are running at a higher level than anywhere else in Scotland.
“They are running at twice the national average.
“Almost all of those relate to opiates, in other words diamorphine, heroin.
“Those who are concerned in supplying class A drugs, particularly diamorphine, in or to Dundee must understand not only that the High Court has made it clear they will not be dealt with gently, but that I regard the rate of drug deaths related to the drug as a relevant factor.”
