By Alesha Capone
The visa of a Thai woman living in Truganina has been cancelled, after she was convicted of a number of crimes including drugs and weapons offences.
The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) last month re-affirmed a decision by the Department of Home Affairs to cancel the 41-year-old woman’s visa.
The tribunal heard the visa was cancelled because the woman – who was only identified by the pseudonym “GWSC” – did not pass a character test under the Australian Migration Act, due to having a “substantial criminal record”.
The tribunal heard that police stopped a vehicle in which the woman and a companion were travelling on September 1, 2015. Police discovered four bags of the drug ice in the vehicle.
The woman was arrested and charged with trafficking, possessing a controlled weapon and dealing in property suspected of being the proceeds of crime.
She was placed on bail and ordered to appear at the Magistrates Court in November 2015.
However, in September that year police searched the Truganina property where the woman and her partner were living and discovered 69 cannabis plants, 476.6 grams of dried cannabis, 12 ecstasy tablets, 6.7 grams of ice, cash, two handguns, a Taser, digital scales, snap-lock bags and an instruction book on growing marijuana.
In 2016, the woman was sentenced to two years and nine months jail after being convicted on a number of charges including cultivating a narcotic plant in a commercial quantity, possessing an unregistered handgun, committing an indictable offence while on bail, possessing a drug of dependence and dealing property suspected to be the proceeds of crime.
Last month, during the AAT hearing, the woman submitted a statement which said her former partner had “coerced her into taking the fall for the charges” in return for protection and care for her son.
But the tribunal issued a decision to cancel the woman’s visa due to “the nature and seriousness” of her conduct.
