FORTY-eight-year-old Briton Mark Sullivan was yesterday ordered to pay $505,400 in fines and spend two years behind bars after he plead guilty to a charge of attempting to smuggle 43 pounds of marijuana out of the country on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Sullivan’s wife, 29-year-old Carol O’Leary – who was jointly charged with the offence – had her charges dropped after her husband convinced the court that she played no part in the crime in the Half-Way-Tree Resident Magistrate’s Court.

According to the prosecution, the couple went to the Norman Manley International Airport on Wednesday and checked in to board a flight to Gatwick, London. Some time afterwards two suitcases belonging to them were searched by the police who found the parcels containing the compressed marijuana.

Presiding judge Judith Pusey ordered Sullivan to pay $15,000 for the possession of the weed, $134,400 for dealing in, and $356,000 for taking steps to export the drug. He was further sentenced by Pusey to spend the two years in prison and faces and additional 12 months behind bars should he fail to pay the fines.