Dublin man pleads guilty in €7m-cannabis case

A man who failed to show up for his trial last year for possession of cannabis valued €7m has pleaded guilty to the charges just before a jury was due to sworn in for a new trial at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.

Stephen Pender (aged 43), who had been on €50,000 bail, was arrested on foot of a bench warrant several days after he failed to appear for the original trial and remanded in custody until today.

Pender, with an address at Glasanaon Road, Finglas, pleaded guilty to possession of cannabis valued at over €7m, for sale or supply at Parkgate Street on November 15, 2005.

Judge Patricia Ryan remanded Pender further in custody and put the case in for mention later this month when a sentence date will be set.

Judge Ryan last November ordered the forfeiture of €50,000 bail which had been put up by his mother-in-law when Pender failed to appear in court for his trial.

A co-accused, David Doyle (aged 21), of Ballygall Parade, Finglas, was sentenced to seven years with three suspended, by Judge Patrick McCartan at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court last February.

Detective Garda Jim McDermot told Mr Tom O’Connell SC (with Ms Caroline Biggs BL), prosecuting, that gardaí received confidential information that a van had picked up a “quantity of cannabis resin” from the JFK Industrial Estate on the Naas Road.

A surveillance operation was set up which led to the gardaí stopping the van that day on Parkgate Street. Doyle was a passenger, while his co-accused was the driver. The drugs were found stacked in timber crates in the back of the vehicle.