A PREGNANT teenager who imported heroin worth £20,000 for drug dealer Tony Felloni has been sentenced to three years' imprisonment.
But Judge Cyril Kelly ordered Josephine Heary (18) should be released from custody on October 1st next.
She had to be punished but it would not benefit the State to leave her baby motherless, Judge Kelly told Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
Judge Kelly noted Heary told her probation officer she agreed to do the drugs run last May because she was five months pregnant and had no income. She was also depressed, concerned with providing for her child and not thinking straight due to her pregnancy, she said.
Equally, the judge said, she should have known the damage caused by drugs and that her child was to be brought up in a situation where she was introducing them.
Heary, Tomas MacDonncha Tower, Ballymun, pleaded guilty to importing the heroin, concealed internally, into Dublin Airport on May 22nd last.
Det Garda Angela Willis said Heary was a typical type of courier employed by unscrupulous drug dealers in that she had no previous convictions and was not known to gardai.
In reply to Judge Kelly, Det Garda Willis also agreed Heary was to be paid only £300 for her role, which amounted to 11/2 per cent of the value of the drugs.
Det Garda Willis said the seizure arose out of a joint Garda Customs operation. Acting on confidential information, gardai were waiting at Dublin Airport for Heary and Luigi Felloni to arrive back with heroin. She had been recruited by Tony Felloni to act as courier.
The court was told Luigi Felloni is awaiting sentence for his role in this importation. Tony Felloni, his father, was jailed recently for 20 years after he admitted a number of heroin dealing offences.
Det Garda Willis told prosecuting counsel, Mr Paul Coffey, she reached Heary and found two condoms with 61.466 grams of heroin in her body. The heroin was 63 per cent pure and Heary was five months pregnant. She had no previous convictions and was co-operative.
Det Garda Willis agreed with defence counsel, Mr Michael O'Higgins, that Tony Felloni had a record going back 30 years of manipulating young girls and was the prime mover in this importation. She was aware that Felloni's wife had claimed in a radio interview that he had turned his daughters to heroin.
Mr O'Higgins said the probation report showed Heary did not have a criminal mind, was naive and vulnerable.