A successful businesswoman who had a secret life as the matriarch of a Newcastle-based crime syndicate, which was responsible for growing and supplying large quantities of cannabis, has been jailed.
Nga White, also known as Emily White, was handed a prison sentence of six years and six months when she faced the District Court at Sydney's Downing Centre, via audio-visual link from Dillwynia Correctional Centre, on Friday morning.
Acting Judge Stephen Walmsley, SC, gave the 48-year-old a four-year non-parole period.
Acting Judge Walmsley convicted White last month after the nail salon owner pleaded not guilty to directing a criminal group, cultivating a large commercial quantity of cannabis and supplying a commercial quantity of cannabis.
She was found guilty after a judge-alone trial in Newcastle District Court.
The sentencing on Friday came more than four years after sweeping police raids uncovered a major cannabis cultivation operation in the former Churchill's building on Steel Street in Newcastle West, which White was renting and where 46.76kg of packaged cannabis leaf and 325 hydroponically-grown cannabis plants were found.
White was also guilty of arranging the sale of 18.18kg of cannabis found inside a car stopped by police shortly before she was arrested.
Her three co-offenders, who Acting Judge Walmsley said on Friday were "in effect, this offender's employees", have each been previously sentenced to four years in jail.
During White's trial, Judge Walmsley was told that police discovered several bags of cannabis stems and root balls at dump sites around Newcastle in early 2017 - police then launched an investigation into the cultivation and supply of cannabis after officers found documents in the bags identifying individuals including White.
Acting Judge Walmsley said on Friday that White was responsible for "directing others to do the necessary work in growing, harvesting and distributing the cannabis".
He said he took special circumstances into account when deciding on White's sentence, including a criminal record which was "minor", the difficult time she has had in custody so far - she has lost 10kg since being convicted - and that he considered her prospect of re-offending to be low.
"She is an intelligent businesswoman and having served a sentence of imprisonment, with all the trouble that will cause for her and her children, I consider she will maintain a life which is crime-free when she is free of jail," Acting Judge Walmsley said.
White will first be eligible for release on parole in March, 2025.
