Smuggler who claimed £5m coke haul was sombreros has jail sentence cut
Border Force stopped Kristopher Purvis in Edinburgh Airport's "nothing to declare" customs channel when he claimed all he brought back from Mexico was four sombreros.
A drug smuggler who was caught with more than £5 million worth of cocaine after claiming that all he brought back from Mexico was four sombreros has won an appeal against his jail sentence.
Kristopher Purvis was stopped by a Border Force officer in the "nothing to declare" customs channel at Edinburgh Airport with a friend and a haul of 45 kilos of the Class A drug was recovered.
Purvis, 35, was jailed for 10 years in April this year after admitting being concerned in the supply of cocaine and being concerned in the fraudulent evasion of the ban on importing controlled drugs on July 24 last year at the airport.
But lawyers acting for the drug smuggler challenged the sentence imposed on him before criminal appeal judges in Edinburgh claiming that the penalty imposed on him was excessive.
Lady Wise, who heard the appeal with Lord Doherty, said: "In the whole circumstances we consider that a sentence of eight years and six months was appropriate."
She said they would allow the appeal and quash the ten year jail term imposed by Lord Summers and substitute imprisonment for eight and a half years.
Lord Summers selected a starting point for his sentence as 15 years but then reduced it by a third as he said Purvis pled guilty at the earliest opportunity.
The appeal judges said the headline sentence should have been lower but disagreed that the plea came at the earliest possible time.
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Purvis, of Mann Crescent, Murton, in County Durham, tendered his guilty pleas to the charge in March this year at the High Court in Edinburgh.
The court heard that he arrived at Edinburgh airport after flying from Mexico via Paris before he was stopped. He and his companion each had a large black suitcase and Purvis was also carrying a bag with four multi-coloured sombreros.
Prosecutor Brian Gill KC told the court: "He said that the only thing that he had acquired in Mexico was the sombreros."
But a search of the cases found 15 vacuum sealed packages covered in mustard to put off sniffer dogs, with each package containing three kilos of cocaine. The maximum street value of the drugs was in excess of pounds 5.6 million.
Purvis was told he was going to be questioned and responded: "It's all mine, my mate has nothing to do with it. I put it in his case." He was arrested and replied: "Yeah, alright I understand. I'm useless and f---ing stupid and I'm f---ed anyway."
The court heard that Purvis stood to have a pounds 5000 debt wiped out and to be paid pounds 20,000 to bring the drugs into the UK.
Defence solicitor advocate Simon Collins argued that the sentence imposed on the first offender was excessive and said he had "a limited involvement"
in what would have been a very lucrative transaction for others with more significant roles in the drugs trade.
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