Jail for drug dealer who didn't stop dealing

26-year-old caught with £3,500 worth of cannabis

A Santon woman who continued dealing drugs despite being handed a suspended prison sentence has been jailed for 30 months.

Megan Louise Fielden was told she’d committed a ‘blatant, flagrant breach’ of a court order, imposed in March last year, during sentencing at Douglas Courthouse today (14 July).

The 26-year-old was arrested a month later, on 5 April, after police went to her property on an unrelated matter; they smelt cannabis and carried out a search.

Almost 180 grams of the Class B substance was recovered – the majority being hidden in two Tupperware containers behind the kickboards in the kitchen; it had a street value of £3,590.

Scales, small bags and £775 of cash was also found and Fielden’s phone was later seized and interrogated.

Messages showed that between 1 October 2021 and 4 July 2022 she’d been concerned in the supply of cannabis to others.

The prosecutor told the court that Fielden was supplying the drug as part of a larger group operation and was not a ‘bottom of the ladder supplier’.

Messages showed threats of enforcement, requests for payment in UK bank notes as well as correspondence showing that others would ‘graft’ for her in order to work off debt.

Fielden’s advocate said her client had continued to offend, despite her prior sentencing for similar offences, to clear her own drug debt so that she could free herself from ‘the murky world of drug dealing’.

“This is somebody who has got into this situation because they have an addiction,” she added before asking Deemster Graeme Cook to consider imposing another suspended sentence.

Addressing Fielden Deemster Cook said he was aware she had ‘three very young and vulnerable children’ but said within weeks of her last sentence she had offended again.

“That was a choice you made,” he told her - adding that suspending any sentence would send out ‘completely the wrong message’.

Activating the original 18-month suspended sentence – and imposing an additional 12 months for the new offence – Deemster Cook jailed her for 30 months.

Fielden also admitted possessing cannabis with intent to supply and was handed a six-month custodial sentence which will run concurrently.

After sending her to prison Deemster Cook told the court: “That gives me no pleasure. I do hope the children will not suffer dramatically.”