DPP v Nguyen [2026] VCC 339

3 I note that on 19 November 2024 and 26 February 2026 your lawyers made written offers to plead guilty to cultivation in not less than a commercial quantity.

4 At trial, the uncontroversial evidence was to the effect that the quantity of cannabis at the Dunluce property was a large commercial quantity, that the cultivation was part of an organised criminal syndicate with a sophisticated setup in an isolated area, including multiple greenhouses, living quarters, and systems in place for irrigation and ventilation, and that your role was solely one of a crop sitter.

5 The only element in dispute was the second part of the third element of the offence, namely whether the jury were satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that you knew that it was not less than a large commercial quantity. On 13 March 2026, the jury acquitted you of the charge of cultivating not less than a large commercial quantity of cannabis.

6 By its verdict the jury was not satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that you knew that the cultivation at the property was not less than a large commercial quantity of cannabis. Accordingly, I sentence you on the basis of a single instance on the day of your arrest of cultivation of not less than a commercial quantity of cannabis.

7 On the authorities[2] the seriousness of the offending, or the objective gravity of the offending often falls to be considered by reference to the quantity or weight of the cannabis cultivated. In this case it is unclear as to precisely what the extent of your knowledge was in relation to the cultivation at the property. The prosecution submitted that the gravity of the offending is not confined to merely a consideration of the quantity of the crop but also the role that the offender plays in the context of an organised criminal syndicate in the sophisticated setup in an isolated area.

8 However, the charge is confined to a single instance of watering or tending on a single day on 29 November 2023, and the Crown conceded that your role in that operation was at the bottom level of the hierarchy as a pure crop sitter and nothing more, in that your only role appears to have been that of watering or tending to some of the plants located on the property. Despite that concession, the prosecution submitted that objectively your offending was still a serious example of the offence of cultivation because of the size of the cultivation at the property.

9 Your counsel, on the other hand, submitted that given your limited involvement in the cultivation, not having been involved at all in the setup or in any of the arrangements made on an ongoing basis to cultivate the crop, in light of the single instance basis of the charge, that your moral culpability was lower than that of a person higher up in the chain of that cultivation syndicate, and that your offending for this reason is a less serious example of the offence.

10 It was common ground that as you have committed a Category 2 offence, (and there are no rare and exceptional circumstances under section 5(2H)(e) of the Sentencing Act 1991 (Vic)), I am required under section 5(2)H of that Act to impose a custodial sentence on you that is not in combination with a Community Corrections Order.

11 Your personal circumstances were addressed by your counsel. You are 44 years old and were 42 years old at the time of offending. You have no criminal convictions. You are the second of four children born and raised in Vietnam. You grew up in a financially stable household and completed high school there before working as a labourer in the construction industry. You married at the age of 26 and had two sons in Vietnam who are now aged in 16 and 20 years old. Your older son showed academic promise and you arranged for him to attend high school in Sydney at the age of 16. He completed high school and is now a Tafe student in Sydney completing an apprenticeship and hoping to convert his student visa into a permanent residence visa.

12 You came to Australia in February 2023 on a tourist visa to visit him and to support him in Sydney emotionally because he was doing Year 12 at school. You also wanted to provide him with some financial support because he was also working part time to make ends meet. You obtained some work in Sydney as a handyman and labourer.

13 You flew back to Vietnam for a week in July of 2023, and then returned to Australia on another tourist visa but this time you came to Melbourne where you believed, because of what some of your Vietnamese compatriots had told you, that you might find better work opportunities. Unfortunately you could not find work in Melbourne.

14 When you went to the St Albans market to seek work, some Vietnamese speaking people put you in touch with others who then arranged for you to be recruited by the syndicate running the cultivation at the Dunluce property. You were taken there immediately. You lived there for five weeks before being arrested. You were told that you would be paid at the end of the harvest but in fact received no payment for your work.

15 During your time in custody you have maintained telephone contact with your son in Sydney and with your family in Vietnam, and you have been working in the timber department during the whole of your period on remand, as well as studying English. However, your English is still very limited. Upon completing your sentence you are likely to be deported to Vietnam where you will return to your wife, home, and previous employment.

16 The purposes of sentencing include denunciation, just punishment, general and specific deterrence, protection of the community, and rehabilitation of the offender. I accept that in your case denunciation, just punishment, and general deterrence have an important role to play.

17 In respect of specific deterrence, I accept, given your lack of prior convictions or any subsequent matters and your strong employment history, as well as the salutary impact of the time in custody spent so far, that this sentencing factor has a less role to play in sentencing you. Similarly, I consider that the sentencing factor of consideration of protection of the community has less role to play in your case because of your very low level role as crop sitter in the enterprise.

18 Finally in relation to rehabilitation, I accept that your prospects of rehabilitation given the lack of prior convictions, the absence of subsequent offending, your strong employment history and supportive family are very good indeed.

19 I accept the matters that have been put in mitigation on your behalf, that you first offered to plead guilty to the statutory alternative charge after the committal hearing in mid November 2024 and that this was a written plea offer at a very early opportunity. I accept that there was a further written offer to the same effect made on 26 February 2026, but that these offers were also flagged in court in July and September 2025 as well as on 31 October 2025. In this regard I accept that had the matter resolved when you first made the offer, there would have been a very strong utilitarian value by your plea in sparing the expense and inconvenience of a trial, but also that such an early and consistently expressed intention to plead guilty to the alternative lesser charge is a fulsome and ongoing demonstration of your remorse.

20 I accept that there has been significant delay in finalising this matter that is not attributable to you, and that during that time you have had this matter hanging over you in terms of having to prepare for trial but have nonetheless maintained employment while in custody with no questionable behaviour.

21 I consider that your offending, taking into account the circumstances of your very limited role as a single instance crop sitter who watered cannabis plants of an unknown number but not less than the commercial quantity, that your offending is a moderate example of this kind of offending but that your role and your moral culpability is lowered somewhat because there was nobody lower than you in this cultivation syndicate, and your involvement is limited to that one day.

22 I acknowledge the cases referred to me by counsel.[3] It is clear that the two

Court of Appeal cases which I have been provided with refer to the need for sentencing judges to determine an appropriate sentence based on the facts of a particular case, and that the two cases that I have been referred to involve conduct which is both more protracted in nature and more involved than that of a mere crop sitter, which is clearly responsible for the higher sentences imposed.

23 Without going into those cases in great detail, it is clear in the case of Hieu Tran Dang that the offender's role was much more than a crop sitter. He facilitated the establishment of hydroponic equipment at the premises. He was aiding and abetting others at the early stages of setting up the dwelling for cultivation. He went on to play a much more significant role at a second premises in terms of securing the electricity supplied by unlawful means and cultivating plant. He was, on appeal, sentenced to three years and four months' imprisonment.

24 In the second case, that of Minh Tri Nguyen in 2021, there the offender, in a sophisticated operation, had a very important role. He obtained a second house for the cultivation of a crop. His role occurred over a four month period and he was clearly motivated by financial gain and his role was treated as a very serious example of a commercial quantity cultivation over four months at two locations, and he was sentenced to a term of imprisonment of five years and six months.

25 I also note that defence referred me to the current sentencing practice as revealed in the Sentencing Snapshot 293[4] which indicates that for the period from 2018 and 2023, the median term of imprisonment imposed for the offence of cultivation of a commercial quantity of cannabis was one of two years and three months' imprisonment. Your defence counsel submitted that in all the circumstances it was appropriate that you be sentenced to time served and the prosecution merely submitted that it was appropriate to impose a sentence of imprisonment and a non-parole period.

26 Having accepted all that was raised in mitigation and accepting that this is a single instance of cultivation, albeit of a large crop or at a site where there was a substantial crop, I consider that in all the circumstances it is appropriate to sentence you to time served. I note that you have served 839 days in

pre-sentence detention, and I note that you are likely to be deported upon your release from custody.

28 Anh Duc Nguyen, for your offence of cultivating not less than a commercial quantity of cannabis you are convicted and sentenced to imprisonment for two years, three months, and 17 days with a non-parole period of 18 months.

29 I declare that 893 days of pre-sentence detention, not including today, is to be deducted administratively from this sentence.

30 I indicate under s6AAA of the Sentencing Act that but for your plea of guilty I would have imposed a sentence of imprisonment of three years and six months with a non-parole period of two years and four months.**

[1] S 72A of the Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Act 1981 (Vic).

[2] Nguyen v The Queen [2021] VSCA 211, [30] ('Nguyen').

[3] Dang v The Queen [2020] VSCA 24; Nguyen (n 2).

[4] Sentencing Advisory Council, Sentencing Snapshot 293, Cultivating a commercial quantity of narcotic plants: sentencing trends in the higher courts of Victoria 2018-19 to 2022-23.