Pubdate: Thu, 23 Sept 1999 Source: Daily Telegraph (UK) Copyright: of Telegraph Group Limited 1999 Contact: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/ Author: Matt Born EARL ESCAPES JAIL AFTER JURY ATTACKS DRUGS STING THE 10th Earl of Hardwicke and his former business partner walked free from court yesterday, despite being convicted of cocaine dealing, after a jury condemned undercover journalistic tactics used to ensnare them. The Tory peer and his colleague Stefan Thwaites, both 29, were given suspended sentences by judge Timothy Pontius after the jury of eight women and three men passed him a note stating: "Had we been allowed to take the extreme provocation into account we would undoubtedly have reached a different verdict." The two were arrested after Mazher Mahmood, an undercover reporter from the News of the World, posed as a wealthy Arab businessman to tempt them into supplying him with drugs. Hardwicke was found guilty at Blackfriars Crown Court, central London, of one count of being concerned in the supply of 2.44 grams of cocaine to Mahmood on Sept 2 last year. They also convicted him of supplying 1.49 grams of the class A drug to the journalist a day later. Thwaites, who used to help him run a south London scooter franchise, was found guilty of supplying the 2.44 grams. Hardwicke was sentenced to two years suspended and Thwaites to 15 months, also suspended, after the judge said he took the jury's statement as a "plea" for leniency. The court was told that Hardwicke had a previous drugs-related caution after being arrested in 1997 with a small quantity of heroin and five 'wraps' of 'crack' cocaine. The two had been secretly filmed ordering cocaine after being lured to The Savoy hotel by Mahmood and another undercover reporter on the pretext that they were interested in ordering scooters. The following day Hardwicke supplied Mahmood with cocaine worth pounds 120 after showing him round the House of Lords. Hardwicke and Thwaites said they intended to appeal against the convictions on the basis that the prosecution was an abuse of the court's process. - --- MAP posted-by: Derek Rea