Kildare man gets three years for €5,000 worth of heroin

A Kildare man who was caught over €5,000 worth of heroin that he was going to sell to four or five friends has been sentenced to three years by Judge Desmond Hogan.

David Campion (aged 29) of Orchard Park, The Curragh, Newbridge, pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to possession of the drugs, worth €5,396 at Keating Park, Naas Road, Rathcoole, on June 3, 2008.

He had 30 previous convictions which included road traffic, burglary, robbery, public order and possession of drugs offences.

Garda Ronan O’Malley told Judge Hogan that Campion claimed in interview that he would be “signing his own death warrant” if he disclosed the names of those he had bought the drugs from.

He said that Campion had been a promising footballer and came from a decent hard working family.

Gda O’Malley told Mr Dominic McGinn BL, prosecuting, that he searched a red van parked in a laneway in Rathcoole after he saw two men in the vehicle smoking heroin. Campion, a passenger in the van, was arrested and the heroin was later found in his boxer shorts.

He told gardaí he had bought the drugs for €800, that he was going to keep €300 worth for himself and sell the rest to four or five friends in Kildare. Campion had been an addict himself for two and half years.

Judge Hogan sentenced Campion to three years in prison which he backdated to when he first went into custody on June 5, 2009 and suspended the balance on strict conditions.