A MAN who tried to import up to £45,500 of cocaine and heroin hidden in Nescafé sachets has been jailed for six years and eight months.

Paul Duffy (43) was caught after Customs officers intercepted the parcel and carried out a covert operation involving a replacement package and a hidden camera.

Crown Advocate Lauren Hallam, prosecuting, told the Royal Court that officers first spotted the parcel at the Jersey Post headquarters at Rue des Prés because it had no customs declaration or sender details.

Inside, they found a vacuum-packed greetings card wrapped in light-green cling film and eight sachets marked as Nescafé capsules.

The sachets contained 33.28 grams of heroin and 16.37 grams of cocaine, with a combined estimated street value of between £32,800 and £45,500.

After a test identified heroin, officers placed a duplicate parcel at the address and secretly filmed Duffy collecting it.

Crown Advocate Hallam said: “He then placed it down his shorts and under his upper clothing, before turning around and walking out of the property.”

A phone was found at his feet, but Duffy “did not respond” when asked if it belonged to him.

During interview, he claimed to have no connection to the flat to which the drugs had been sent, other than that his mother lived on the same estate.

When officers searched Duffy’s own flat, they discovered weighing scales, about 1,000 small self-sealing plastic bags and 0.54 grams of cocaine.

Duffy claimed the bags “were ordered by mistake from Temu but he had occasionally used the bags to manage his medicinal cannabis doses”, Crown Advocate Hallam said.

His phone contained photographs of money on the floor and kitchen roll, as well as “a knife on a toilet seat with a small amount of white powder”.

Officers also found a message from someone asking about the price of 100 diazepam tablets.

Duffy denied supplying controlled drugs. When asked why he had collected the package, he described himself as “a thieving bastard”.

A drugs expert said the bags and scales were “synonymous with drug dealing”.

Advocate Allana Binnie, defending, stressed that Duffy should be sentenced according to his basis of plea.

She said he had arranged the importation himself without involving anyone else.

The court heard that Duffy had maintained a good employment record until he was diagnosed with epilepsy and became unable to work.

He had struggled with substance misuse for years and “his life has been completely marred by that issue”, Advocate Binnie said.

Duffy had 39 previous convictions, including ten for drug-related offences, but had successfully detoxed in custody after making several previous attempts to stop using drugs.

It was the first time in seven or eight years that he had been sober, the defence advocate added.

Advocate Binnie said the importation was “nearly totally driven financially, due to his addiction”.

Duffy was sentenced to six years and eight months for being knowingly concerned in the importation of heroin and the same term for importing cocaine. The sentences will run concurrently. No separate penalty was imposed for possessing cocaine.

Customs senior manager Luke Goddard said: “This seizure demonstrates the effectiveness of JCIS controls at the Post Office and our ability to apprehend those attempting to import controlled drugs.”

He added that the case highlighted drug smugglers’ disregard for innocent people whose addresses they used in an attempt to avoid prosecution.

Commissioner Sir Timothy Le Cocq was presiding alongside Jurats Le Cornu, Opfermann and Entwistle.