Sentencing: Factfile
He noted six areas where the club owner had made efforts to tackle drugs, including the 'undoubted genuine offer' to pay for two uniformed police officers to be stationed outside the club 'all night as a warning' to drug dealers and users.
Mr Donne also noted Bahmanzadeh's change of security company after problems with the previous one, and the 'very high' number of people arrested at the Dance Academy who were “shopped” to police.
He said that '52 Dance Academy-engendered arrests of dealers and suppliers in 15 months – some were major suppliers' showed positive steps were being made. He also noted the upgrading of the club's CCTV system before it became a condition of the licence, the 'consistent instruction' to DJs and bar staff, admitted by both defence and prosecution witnesses, about the zero-tolerance attitude towards drugs, and how they should bring drug-dealers to the attention of security staff.
He ended by noting there was an 'absence of any evidence' that Bahmanzadeh would go easy on any dealers or suppliers, and claimed witnesses for both sides openly admitted he was personally 'strongly anti-drugs', with no previous convictions for drug offences. He invited Judge Gilbert to view Bahmanzadeh as 'a successful businessman keen to keep his costs down'.
He also claimed Bahmanzadeh had lost everything he had ever worked for since the police raid on May 7, 2006.
He said: “He has lost everything that matters to him, everything that he spent all that time, putting his energy and emotion into.
“The closure and conviction has lost him everything.
“To lose everything for being too stingy to pay for more doormen was very sad. It's a very substantial punishment that he has – through his stinginess – lost everything.”
Costelloe's advocate, Vincenzo Esposito, also attempted to mitigate his client's sentence, noting he was 'a conscientious, hard-working' man who never had a day off sick. As a DJ he was 'certainly very talented' and though dedicated to the club he did not 'employ an evil motive'.
Mr Esposito said: “The last two years have been very difficult indeed for him and his family.
“He has become engaged to his girlfriend. His parents – who didn't know about this trial until the very last day – are devastated”.
He explained how Costelloe – who has a five-year-old daughter – was an active parent who took his responsibilities 'very seriously indeed'.
He added: “He is having a very difficult time in prison. He is not a career criminal. His rehabilitation commenced two years ago, at his arrest. He has continued to ply his trade and DJd for club C103. There has been no reoffending. He wishes to put this chapter behind him and move on. He is not unintelligent, and an ideal candidate for putting something back into the community.”
He then noted how drug-dealers – some of whom were caught in the Dance Academy – had been offered suspended sentences and community work as punishment.
However, both advocates' pleas appeared to make little headway with Judge Gilbert QC who dissected each of Mr Donne's claims in sentencing Bahmanzadeh – who has four previous convictions for theft, obstructing a police officer, possession of an offensive weapon and assault causing actual bodily harm in 1989 which saw him serve a three-month jail sentence.
Judge Gilbert QC said he 'expressly' rejected the submissions, saying: “You both deliberately promoted the premises to be used for the supply of class A, to better the club's reputation and profits”.
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