A Lake Macquarie tradie who was unable to work after suffering a serious leg injury in a motorbike crash, relapsed into drugs and quickly rose to the top of a major Hunter syndicate supplying kilograms of ice, MDMA, cocaine and cannabis.
Cardiff South carpenter Zak Stewart, now 29, was "distributing misery throughout the Hunter Region" as he directed 11 lower-ranking syndicate members to courier large quantities of drugs and cash from Sydney to Newcastle and across the Hunter, Judge Paul Marr said on Monday.
Between October 2024 and his arrest in February 2025, Stewart supplied 5.8 kilograms of ice, 1.5kg of MDMA, 1kg of cocaine, more than 2kg of cannabis and smaller quantities of LSD, ketamine, oxycodone, psilocybin and heroin.
"I have made $65K off [ice] and $17K off [cocaine]," he said in one intercepted call.
In another call he boasted about supplying "5 f---en kegs that week".
Stewart, who went by "Grimace" on an encrypted messaging app, was an "unsophisticated and inexperienced" dealer who often used his home and spoke openly on his own phone about supplying drugs.
"He was someone who was completely out of his depth in terms of how to hide his conduct from the police," Judge Marr said.
"It shows his immaturity, naivety and is indicative of his true character, that he was someone who took the opportunity to deal drugs to people he knew and didn't try to hide it from the authorities."
Judge Marr said Stewart had grown up in Warners Bay and completed a carpentry apprenticeship.
He had a drug addiction as a teenager and in his early 20s, but managed to maintain his employment.
In 2022, he suffered a serious leg injury in a motorcycle accident, leaving him unable to work and in significant pain.
He became addicted to prescription painkillers and then relapsed into methamphetamine when doctors would no longer provide him with scripts for oxycodone.
Stewart told a psychiatrist that he effectively spent his life savings on methamphetamine and fell into debt.
Unable to work, he started supplying drugs to fund his habit and pay off what he owed.
"Things snowballed," Stewart said.
"I made the wrong choices and I regret it.
"I f---ed up big time.
"Since I have been in custody I see what I've done to people.
"The impact of drugs, I hadn't seen it until now.
"I'm sorry I didn't realise how serious it was."
Stewart's barrister, Rebekah Court, said the motorcycle accident triggered a "descent into madness" and the tradie was in "well over his head" in the drug supply enterprise.
By 2024, Stewart was near the top of the hierarchy in the Hunter and would send a courier to Sydney once every six days to collect a kilogram of methamphetamine.
The drugs would then be on-supplied to a number of dealers, the cash would be collected and the process would repeat.
In total, in the space of less than four months, Stewart supplied nearly 5.8kg of ice, 11 times the quantity that carries a maximum of life imprisonment.
He also sold other substances and was essentially running a one-stop drug shop that included cocaine, MDMA, cannabis, heroin and LSD.
Judge Marr said Stewart was now remorseful and his trade and family support meant he was unlikely to reoffend.
He said Stewart's letter of apology showed he understood how many people he had let down and the negative impact he had on the community.
"He now realises that all he has done is distribute misery throughout the Hunter Region, misery for other people," Judge Marr said.
He jailed Stewart for a maximum of nine years, with a non-parole period of six years, making him eligible for parole in 2031.
