When sentencing co-offenders in drug syndicate cases, the sentencing judge must adequately distinguish between offenders with different roles and not equate their culpability through inconsistent characterisations. A sentencing judge's failure to reconcile descriptions of an offender's role (e.g., describing it as both 'minor' and 'substantial') and failure to give sufficient recognition to differences in co-offenders' roles and subjective circumstances constitutes sentencing error. Sentencing statistics are of limited utility for broadly-defined drug supply offences under s 25 of the Drug Misuse and Trafficking Act 1985 (NSW).
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