A man convicted of lighting a series of fires in suburban Lake Macquarie in late 2019 before being caught transporting just under 400g of the drug ice from Sydney to the Hunter while on bail in late 2021 will walk free from jail early next month.
Chad Joseph Musgrave, 36, was successful in Newcastle District Court on Friday in appealing the severity of a sentence handed down earlier this year in relation to a string of rubbish fires he lit near homes in the Windale area.
Musgrave set several items alight after they had been left out for kerbside pick-up before he torched four vehicles in the carpark of a Windale apartment complex about a week later.
In court on Friday, Judge Roy Ellis reduced Musgrave's three-year aggregate jail sentence to 18 months on appeal.
Then, in dealing with the drug supply charges, Judge Ellis sentenced Musgrave to a total of two years and six months in jail, with a 12-month non-parole period.
The court heard that Musgrave was caught driving 390g of methamphetamine from Sydney to the Hunter region last December.
The Crown accepted that Musgrave did not know how much ice he was transporting, though he knew he was acting as courier for illicit drugs.
The sentences were backdated to account for the time Musgrave has spent in custody for both matters - more than 90 weeks.
Judge Ellis described the firebug offences as "rather senseless".
"You don't ... really seem to have any understanding as to why you did it," he said.
"That tells you that for you to be using illicit substances, as you were, is a pretty dangerous thing.
"Why in the heck you did these [offences], it's not obvious to anybody really - including you. So that should make you fairly fearful about using drugs."
Musgrave will automatically qualify for an 18-month parole period from December 5.
