A prison officer who admitted smuggling drugs and mobile phones into his jail has appealed against his sentence.
John Wallace was sentenced to three years and four months imprisonment in March after pleading guilty at Inverness Sheriff Court.
His appeal against the sentence will be heard at the appeal court in Edinburgh today.
Previously Inverness Sheriff Court heard that Wallace, 36, was paid £1,800 to deliver the contraband over a five-month period to help pay off mounting family debts.
He would place the drugs and phones into socks, then into cardboard boxes labelled “Beat the Bosses Mobile Phone” and throw them over the prison wall.
When he was next on duty, he picked them up on the other side.
Wallace, of Craigmore Crescent in Nethy Bridge, admitted two charges that between October 27, 2015 and March 18, 2016, he introduced without reasonable excuse to HMP Porterfield Prison, mobile phones and cannabis resin, being prohibited articles and repeatedly threw parcels containing the phones and cannabis over the wall into prison grounds, collect them and take them into prison.
He also pleaded guilty to being concerned in the supply of cannabis resin in the prison and elsewhere whilst acting with others.
At the time of sentencing in Match, Sheriff Gordon Fleetwood described his actions as a “gross breach of trust”.
Wallace’s solicitor advocate Urfan Dar told the court he was spending 23 hours a day in effectively solitary confinement because of his previous job.
Police were tipped off about the smuggling and Wallace’s illicit activities were halted on March 18 when he was arrested.
The court was told that officers pounced when Wallace was in the Tesco Car Park at Inshes, Inverness.
He immediately told them: “There’s drugs in the car”…. “they’re in a red bag in the boot of the car”.
When interviewed by the police, Wallace said: “I was desperate, I didn’t know what else to do and am guilty. I am now going to lose everything and I know that. I have had a lot of time to think this morning in the cell and I know it’s coming. No one to blame but myself.”
