DEEP in debt and looking to maintain both a roof over his family's head and his long-term drug addiction, Brett Robert Pearce was offered an "opportunity" by his brother, Matthew Pearce.
Matthew Pearce - the head of a major Hunter drug syndicate that included Les Mason and former Newcastle Knight Jarrod Mullen, among others - needed someone to help him supply large quantities of cocaine and manufacture and supply litres of industrial solvent Butanediol, an alternative to dangerous party drug Gamma-Hydroxybutyrate (GHB).
From an audio visual suite at Cessnock Correctional Centre, Brett Pearce said he now felt "disgusted" with himself and had become acutely aware that his involvement in the syndicate had not only split his family apart, but no doubt numerous other families.
Brett Pearce and Matthew Pearce's Sydney connection, Aaron Macey, two of the higher ranking members of the syndicate, faced a sentence hearing in Newcastle District Court on Friday.
Macey has pleaded guilty to supplying 100 litres of industrial solvent Butanediol, an alternative to party drug Gamma-Hydroxybutyrate (GHB), and nearly 400 grams of cocaine.
Matthew Pearce was also expected to begin sentence proceedings on Friday, but his defence wanted to make last minute and wide-ranging amendments to the agreed facts, forcing the matter to be adjourned for a disputed facts hearing.
Brett Pearce and Aaron Macey will be sentenced on May 22. Mason was jailed in March for a maximum of six years, with a non-parole period of three years and three months.
