A man who trapped, drugged and bashed his girlfriend in her bedroom has pleaded guilty to hiding almost a kilogram of cocaine and $40,000 cash under his neighbour's home.
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David Anthony O'Brien, 52, pleaded guilty this week to drug trafficking for more than two years, selling to friends and acquaintances, and dealing in the proceeds of crime.
Police searched O'Brien's house in August 2012 and were told that someone had been accessing his neighbour's storage area under their property without permission.
Court documents show officers were told O'Brien had been seen in the neighbour's driveway, near the door that led under their house.
Police searched the storage space and found a red cloth bag, which later produced a match to the accused's DNA.
Inside the bag, they found 931 grams of cocaine, 37 per cent pure, and $39,900 cash.
A further $5000 cash was found hidden in a guitar amplifier in O'Brien's living room.
The Crown, represented by Anthony Williamson, alleged that the money was the proceeds of O'Brien's ''trafficking enterprise''.
O'Brien's car was searched, revealing a set of scales in the glove box and a hidden brown paper bag in the front passenger foot well, with 25 grams of cocaine inside.
The defendant was due to go to trial in the ACT Supreme Court next week, but pleaded guilty to the two offences on Wednesday.
The court heard on Friday that O'Brien had agreed to the facts of the offences and the trial was vacated by Chief Justice Helen Murrell.
The pleas on the drug and proceeds-of-crime charges come less than two weeks after O'Brien was found guilty of separate offences by Justice John Burns in the ACT Supreme Court. Those charges related to a violent episode in which O'Brien trapped his girlfriend in her bedroom for two nights, bashing and drugging her and threatening to kill her and ''bury her in the forest''.
The crimes took place following a party the couple went to in Weston in August 2012. They stayed until late, but the woman suggested they leave about midnight.
Justice Burns found that O'Brien became angry and when they arrived back home, he turned and punched the woman in the face while sitting in the car in their driveway. The victim was shocked and went inside and saw her injuries in a mirror.
O'Brien dragged her by her hair into the bedroom and began repeatedly punching her - the woman believed between 10 and 15 times.
The woman was trapped in the room for two nights and the man threatened to kill her, slammed her head against a wall, and stuck his fingers into her eyes when she complained she was going blind.
He stopped her from leaving and forced her to take Xanax tablets and painkillers.
At one point, she called triple-0 and left her phone lying face down in the room so he wouldn't see.
He came into the room and she began talking loudly to mask the sound of the call.
She thinks she remembered him grabbing the phone, beating her, and then throwing her to the bed.
Eventually, he took her to hospital, telling her to make up a story that she was bashed in the Hellenic Club. He told her to say that he had come in and saved her from the fictitious attack.
O'Brien will now be sentenced for the drug, proceeds-of-crime and violence offences. A charge of aggravated perjury is expected to be taken into account in sentencing, according to court documents.
The case is expected to come back before the court later this month.
