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Graphic designer banked more than £40,000 from drug dealing, court hears

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A graphic designer allegedly banked more than £40,000 in cash after selling cocaine and cannabis to contacts across North Devon and North Cornwall. Zachary Gardener was earning just £18,000 a year from his job with a family firm but paid in large sums of cash to three different current accounts over three years, a jury have been told. Police found digital scales and a mixing bowl with traces of cocaine and cannabis in a safe in his bedroom at his family home in Holsworthy. Texts of his iPhone contained coded messages allegedly from customers in Bude and North Devon and suggested he was making trips up country to buy drugs. Gardener, aged formerly of Mitre Court, Holsworthy, but now living in Sutherland Road, Plymouth, admitted being concerned in the supply of cocaine. He denies supplying skunk cannabis and three counts of money laundering. Mr Jonathan Barnes, prosecuting, said Gardener was arrested in a police raid on his girlfriend's flat in The Strand, Barnstaple, in April 2012 and his room at his parents' home was searched. Police found a set of digital scales and a bowl with traces of drugs on them in a safe as well as seven ounces of the cutting agent benzocaine. Mr Barnes said Gardener told police he was a user rather than a dealer and kept the scales to check he had not been short changed on the drugs he bought. He said:"We say he was dealing both cocaine and cannabis, principally cocaine, in such a way that he received substantial sums of cash. There was no substantial stash of drugs but dealers often do not keep supplies at their own homes. "A substantial number of text messages were found on his phone which provide clear evidence he was involved in dealing drugs in quite a substantial way. "Many were coded but it is plain enough what was going on and there are a substantial number which are consistent with drug dealing. "He was dealing cannabis on a lesser scale but there are message which we say refer to skunk cannabis. One asked if there was any cheese around. We say he was not selling camembert or cheddar but this refers to skunk because of its smell." He said contacts in Gardener's phone used nicknames such as Rumstumps and Twinkletoes and the texts included drugs slang. Terms for cocaine included posh and snow and other expressions included Percy, meaning personal supply and CD, meaning controlled drugs. Some messages arranged meetings in Bideford while another read:"All right mate, are you coming to Bude tonight. Can you sort out some posh things". Mr Barnes said texts about paying in money could be linked to individual credits in Gardener's three current accounts, one with Lloyds and two with Barclays. He said a financial analysis by police initially identified £63,000 in unexplained credits but Gardener had given a fuller version of his finances which reduced with figure to £44,000. He said more than £9,000 was paid in cash to one account and more than £40,000 in cash into another at a time when Gardener was earning £18,000 as a graphic designer and had a self confessed £280 a week cocaine habit.

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