‘Mercy plea’ to court from Latvian farmer jailed over €2.5m cocaine haul

A “mercy plea” from a Latvian famer – who was caught in this country with cocaine worth €2.5m – to have his jail sentence cut short so he can return to his homeland has been dismissed by the Court of Appeal. 

Dmitrijs Venskovics (45), with a Latvian address, was jailed for eight years after he pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to having the 36kg of cocaine for sale or supply on April 24, 2020, at Maxol service station at Stafffordstown, Donabate, Co Dublin. 

He later appealed the severity of the sentence imposed by Judge Martin Nolan in Nolan in November 2020.   

At the Court of Appeal Friday, February 11 Damien Colgan SC, for the appellant, said his client was given around €200 to place a number of boxes containing the drugs in his lorry and that he wasn’t the person who would have made “any serious financial gain” from the contraband. 

Counsel added that the admissions his client had made on his arrest were of “considerable assistance” to gardai. 

Mr Colgan, however, conceded that the appeal against the eight-year term imposed on his client was being made on an “ad misericordiam basis”. 

He said his client, who doesn’t speak English, suffers from a heart condition and was recently transferred from Mountjoy Prison to the Mater Hospital for treatment. 

“He should have had a portion of the sentence suspended so he could get out of this country and get back home,” Mr Colgan told the court, urging the judges to go the “extra mile” in respect of his client.  

In response, Karl Finnegan BL, for the Director of Public Prosecutions, said the eight-year term was “within the ambit” of previous sentences handed down for similar offences. 

Dismissing the appeal, Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy, sitting with Mr Justice John Edwards, presiding, and Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy, said the court could find “no error in principle” by the sentencing judge. 

Noting that Mr Colgan’s had been “candid” in stating his grounds for appeal, Mr Justice McCarthy added that it was not a “proper basis” for quashing the original term. 

Previous evidence. 

Dublin Circuit Criminal Court was told that Venskovics had been a beef farmer in his native land but was working as a lorry driver when he was stopped by gardai. 

He began working as an international HGV driver because his farm wasn’t making enough money for him to feed his family, the court was told. 

Venskovics informed arresting officers via an interpreter that a Russian male approached him and told him he would be paid between €150 and €200 to take a consignment of boxes in his lorry.  

He said he was told they contained cocaine and was given an Irish phone number to call when he had parked his vehicle at a certain location. 

Judge Martin Nolan said he was satisfied that Venskovics role was that of a transporter and he didn't own the drugs.  

Garda Redmond O'Leary told Karl Finnegan BL, prosecuting, that Venskovics was kept under surveillance following a garda tip off. Officers saw the boxes being moved from Venskovics’ vehicle to a Ford Transit van before they moved in to search both vehicles. 

Gda O'Leary said while Venskovics’ own lorry was being searched, 36kg of cocaine was discovered in the Ford Transit van, the majority of which had been hidden in a concealed compartment. 

Venskovics was arrested and admitted that he had collected the boxes but said he had never handled them. 

Man appears in court arising from big Laois drugs haul

Gda O'Leary agreed with Dominic McGinn SC, defending, that neither his client's DNA nor fingerprints were found on the boxes. 

Two Laois men sent for Circuit Court trial arising from incident in cemetery

He accepted that Venskovics had “nothing to connect him to wider criminality” and was on “the lowest rung of the ladder” in the operation. 

Mr McGinn said that while Venskovics' role was that of transporter he was “a vital cog in the big machine”.