A professional bodybuilder has been jailed for over two years for “banging out” cocaine and anabolic steroids.
James Michael Mulroney, 38, who also worked as a fitness instructor, was outwardly all about health and wellbeing – but he was pursuing a very lucrative sideline in the sale of illicit drugs.
Prosecutor Frances Pencheon said a police investigation began following the death of a drug user in York.
“Police suspected that the partner of the deceased purchased drugs from the defendant at some point,” she added.
In July 2018, police searched Mulroney’s vehicle and seized his mobile phone. They also found a bag of cocaine.
The following day, officers searched his house and found steroids and two more mobiles. Analysis of the phones revealed incriminating messages which revealed that Mulroney had been supplying cocaine “on tick”.
The messages showed Mulroney bragging about his criminal enterprise and boasting to his contacts that he had made a £1,000 profit “from £4,400 of cocaine on one night of an England World Cup match”.
He also kept handwritten debtors’ or “dealer” lists running into thousands of pounds.
Ms Pencheon said the messages showed that Mulroney had also been supplying anabolic steroids, a Class C drug and growth hormone used for body-bulking. He had been supplying the illegal drug for about three years, initially by buying in bulk and supplying to those he knew.
By 2017, Mulroney’s customer base had expanded out to West Yorkshire as more and bigger orders came in.
“He was an established supplier of steroids and was actively pursuing an expansion of his business,” added Ms Pencheon.
A financial expert said total drug sales were likely to be in the region of £33,000, although Mulroney’s actual profits were unknown.
Pornographic videos
Police also found two extreme self-made pornographic videos on Mulroney’s phone which had been concealed in a fake Calculator app.
Mulroney made and appeared in the videos which showed him performing warped sexual acts on an unknown woman. The videos, sent to a contact via a messenger app, featured a knife – and in one of the images cocaine could be seen on the tip of the blade.
In messages sent from Mulroney’s phone on the same night, he told a contact that the woman in the videos was “just some random bird off Tinder”.
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Despite Mulroney’s initial arrest in 2018, the case didn’t reach court until January this year due to the complexity of the case, his own denial as to the extent of his dealing and the death of his co-accused.
Mulroney, now of Tadcaster Road, York, was charged with multiple offences including being concerned in the supply of cocaine and anabolic steroids and possessing extreme pornographic images.
He admitted supplying the Class A and C drugs and possessing the illicit images. Other charges, which he denied, were either dropped by the prosecution or allowed to lie on court file.
Mulroney admitted the drug offences on the basis that some of the customer debts and the money he made came from legitimate business such as fitness and bodybuilding training and the sale of protein food supplements.
He said he was heavily addicted to cocaine at the time of the drug business and that he knew other drug users, some of whom went to the same gym.
Mental health issues
Mulroney, a strapping former rugby player who has lately been working as a foreman on a construction site, said he had been using cocaine since about 2016 and had mental health issues including depression.
“I was trying to carve out a career as a professional bodybuilder and it makes you isolated,” he added.
“You have no one around you; it’s a very selfish sport. Taking drugs made me feel (good).”
He said that by the beginning of 2018 his drug use had spiralled out of control and he ended up in a “little one-bed flat” in Milner Street, Acomb.
He said he worked at a gym, in security and for a charity, but had a “big bank loan and credit-card debts” totalling about £20,000.
Ms Pencheon said the drug enterprise was Mulroney’s “own operation” and there was “evidence of financial gain”.
She said he had a previous conviction for wounding or inflicting grievous bodily harm from 2008.
Neil Cutte, mitigating, said that Mulroney was now a “different man” to the one who was dealing in 2017 and 2018.
However, judge Sean Morris said it had to be an immediate jail sentence because “drug dealers need to know that when they decide to embark upon that kind of work” they go to prison.
He said Mulroney had done himself “no favours… by trying to wriggle out of the extent of your dealing” and that he was “banging out (steroids) for years”.
Mulroney was jailed for two-and-a-half years.
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