Teen who possessed €43,000 worth of heroin given seven years

A teenager who had heroin worth €43,000 in a car outside his mother’s home has been sentenced to seven years at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.

Jonathon Golding (aged 19) of Marigold Crescent, Darndale told gardaí he was holding the heroin for another person to pay off a drugs debt of around €2,000, which he’d accumulated from taking tablets and "skunk" everyday since his father died the previous year.

Golding pleaded guilty to possessing 219 grams of heroin found in a lunchbox under a seat of his car parked outside the premises on April 12, 2008.

Garda Ciaran Cummins told prosecution counsel, Mr Sean Gillane BL, that gardai found eight bags of heroin, €430 cash and a weighing scales during a search of the house and vehicle. Golding told gardaí that he was in fear of the person who gave him the drugs to hold.

Judge Frank O’Donnell said this was "an excuse that is continually trotted out and it does not bear any influence with me."

He noted that Golding had 23 previous convictions, including several for drug offences but that he had not come to garda attention since his arrest. He suspended the final two years of the sentence for seven years on strict conditions including two years probation supervision.