THE GROUNDWORK had been laid for hundreds of kilograms of cocaine to be shipped to an Upper Hunter property.
Peter Leslie Ritson had created a front freight company, opened a bank account, established contact with a "mysterious" man in Peru and recruited a naive co-offender to be his "secretary".
For four years, the now 62-year-old was "extremely committed to the cause" of conspiring to import a commercial quantity of drugs into Australia.
He was far from a mastermind in the scheme of the international syndicate, but he had an important job to do on this side of the world.
It was a job that has now landed him in jail for a decade, but when he looked back on his role, he told the court: "It was a job and I had to eat".
Through either mismanagement or border force intercepts, Ritson's efforts to facilitate the arrival of four shipping containers - each secretly packed with more than 100 kilograms of drugs - failed each time.
The first shipping container arrived in August 2018 and was taken to a property near Scone, where Ritson and his accomplice, well-known horse identity Felicity Fraser, pulled apart wood trying to find where 100 kilograms of cocaine had been hidden.
In 2019, two more shipments arrived but no drugs ever did.
"There was planning under way for the fourth container," Judge Troy Anderson said during sentencing in Sydney Downing Centre District Court on Friday.
That planning extended into 2021 due to logistical issues with international shipping in the COVID-19 pandemic, and the fourth shipment never arrived.
Between 2017 and 2020, Ritson had also arranged his overseas contacts to send "samples" of illicit drugs - cocaine, methamphetamine and heroin - hidden in paper, juke boxes, coconut oil and ink toner cartridges.
The court heard about $1.5 million went through the bank account Ritson and Fraser had access to, though it remained unclear how much Ritson was paid for his role.
Judge Anderson said Ritson was a "low-level facilitator" who was not involved in sourcing the "industrial" amounts of drugs in South America.
The court heard Ritson said in his evidence earlier that he was paid between $20,000 and $30,000 during his years-long involvement in the operation.
"He was simply a small cog in a very large international syndicate," Judge Anderson said.
"Clearly the offender expected there to be large quantities of cocaine imported into Australia, and clearly expected a financial reward."
The court heard details of Ritson's chaotic and unstable upbringing, the remorse he had shown, and the full admissions he had made to police when he was arrested in February 2022.
Judge Anderson on Friday sentenced Ritson to 10 years and six months behind bars, with a non-parole period of seven years.
He had pleaded guilty to conspiring to import a commercial quantity of a border-controlled drug.
He was handed a four-month jail term for firearms offences, after police discovered a rifle in his shed when they searched his property.
With time served, Ritson will be eligible for release in March 2029.
Fraser was sentenced in Newcastle District Court in August last year to nine-and-a-half years behind bars, with five years and six months non-parole, for her role.
The pair met when they were both working for an equine transport company in Scone.
