Prison Tonic For £300K Cocaine Courier

A cocaine courier, caught stepping off a Caribbean flight with over £300,000 worth of the drug hidden inside eleven bottles of tonic drinks, has been jailed for six years.

Painter and decorator Peter Mawhinney, 41, of Woden Road, Wolverhampton tried to convince UK Border Agency officers he had spent an innocent week-long holiday in Jamaica to “clear his head” after a suicide bid.

The father-of-two pleaded guilty at Croydon Crown Court to smuggling 578 gms of 100% pure cocaine at Gatwick Airport on December 17, last year.

Prosecutor Miss Cynthia Caiquo told the court Mawhinney was travelling alone on a Virgin Atlantic flight from Montego Bay when he was stopped and quizzed by officers.

“He said he had packed his bag himself and had not been forced to bring anything into the UK.

“Inside his bag were eleven bottles of 'Triple S' tonic vitamin drink, which Mawhinney said he had paid five hundred pounds for and were for himself and his friends.

“The bottles' seals seemed uncommercial and when tested were positive for cocaine.”

Mawhinney's lawyer Mr. Andrew Stephens told the court: “He fell on hard times, work was difficult to find, and he got himself into financial difficulties and borrowed just over two thousand pounds from a loan shark.

“What he had to pay back was increasing day by day and was approaching ten thousand pounds when he was told: 'Pay now or suffer the consequences.'

“Threats were made to him about his physical well-being and the safety of his two girls, aged eighteen and five years-old.

“He was told he could eradicate his debt by flying to Jamaica and picking something up.

“His luggage was taken, items put in, and he couriered them back.”

Judge Stephen Waller told Mawhinney, who received fifty-four months imprisonment in Jersey for previous drugs offences: “Skilfully concealed within the bottles was the cocaine, which would have been recovered once it was smuggled into the country.”

The court also made an order restricting Mawhinney's foreign travel for three years after his release from prison.