Galashiels man who admitted involvement in serious organised crime avoids jail
A 50-year-old man from Galashiels who got involved in transporting large sums of criminal cash to service his former partner's spiralling drug debt has narrowly avoided a custodial sentence.
Jason Brown was caught "red-handed" with more than £10,000 in his vehicle after being stopped by police on the A7 - near to Melville Dykes Road, Dalkeith - in June 2022.
Selkirk Sheriff Court previously heard he had been put under surveillance as part of an operation targeting the supply of illegal substances in the Scottish Borders, which last year saw 37-year-old Chris Ferguson, also from Galashiels, jailed for seven-and-a-half years.
Brown, of Laidlaw Court, Galashiels, admitted agreeing with Ferguson, and others not known to the prosecutor, to do something that he knew or suspected, or ought to have known or suspected, would enable or further the commission of serious organised crime, in that he did agree with them to obtain, transfer and store quantities of money between various locations and to others.
He committed the offence at addresses at Coulter Avenue in Galashiels, Alloway Drive in Kirkintilloch, and elsewhere in Scotland, between March 15th, 2022 and June 2nd, 2022.
The court heard Ferguson's finger prints were found on the money bag seized by police when Brown was stopped in Midlothian.
Brown's solicitor Ed Hulme said his client helped out of loyalty after becoming aware his former partner was under continued threat and danger, but was just a small part of a much wider operation.
Sheriff Peter Paterson, who was shown injuries the woman had suffered, said that while custody was at the forefront of his mind, he accepted she had been a controlling influence on him.
At Jedburgh Sheriff Court today (Monday), Brown was instead given a nine-month home curfew - which means he must remain at his property between 7pm and 7am each night - and ordered to complete 220 hours of unpaid work.
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