Drug offences in Queensland

The offences, the sections and the maximums

The maximum penalties below are ceilings set by Parliament, not predictions. They matter mainly because they determine which court can deal with your charge.

The maximum for trafficking was raised from 25 years to life by the Police Powers and Responsibilities and Other Legislation Amendment Act (No. 2) 2023 (Qld). Section 5 now carries life regardless of the schedule of the drug.

The quantity thresholds that decide your court

Schedules 1 and 2 of the Drugs Misuse Regulation 1987 (Qld) list which drugs are which. Schedule 1 covers heroin, cocaine, methylamphetamine, amphetamine, MDMA, LSD and phencyclidine. Schedule 2 covers cannabis, ketamine, anabolic steroids, methadone, opium and a long list of others.

Schedules 3 and 4 do something different. They set weight thresholds, and crossing one changes the maximum penalty and often the court.

Two traps sit inside that table. First, for several drugs the schedules operate on the pure quantity, so a large bag of low purity material can fall below a threshold that the gross weight appears to exceed. Certificates of analysis are worth reading rather than accepting. Second, section 9(2) aggregates: where you possess more than one drug listed in schedule 1, part 2, the quantities are added together regardless of type.

Which court will hear your charge

This is the question that changes the timeline, the cost and your realistic exposure.

• Magistrates Court. Section 13 of the Drugs Misuse Act allows most supply, production and possession charges carrying up to 15 years to be dealt with summarily. Section 14 allows a possession charge with a higher maximum to be heard summarily where the prosecution does not allege a commercial purpose. On a summary conviction the magistrate cannot impose more than 3 years imprisonment.
• District Court. Indictable drug matters where the maximum is 20 years or less, including most aggravated supply and larger possession and production charges.
• Supreme Court. Trafficking under section 5, and other charges where the maximum exceeds 20 years.

The three year ceiling on a summary conviction is why the fight about whether a matter stays in the Magistrates Court is often more valuable than any argument about the facts. It is also why an allegation of commercial purpose in a possession charge is worth challenging early.

Your phone is usually the case

In modern Queensland drug prosecutions the seizure is rarely the evidence. The phone is. Supply and trafficking are almost always proved from messages, transaction records, contact patterns and photographs rather than from what was found in a pocket.

Police can obtain an order under section 154 of the Police Powers and Responsibilities Act 2000 (Qld), usually within a search warrant, requiring a specified person to provide the access information for a device. Contravening that order is an offence under section 205A of the Criminal Code with a maximum of 5 years imprisonment, and Queensland courts have imposed suspended terms for it.

That creates a genuinely difficult decision, and it is one to take with advice rather than at the kitchen table at 6am. Whether an order was validly made, whether it was properly served, and what it actually requires are all things worth checking before anyone decides anything.

Diversion, and whether you end up with a record

Queensland has a legislated three tier police drug diversion scheme under section 378A of the Police Powers and Responsibilities Act 2000 (Qld). Since 3 May 2024 it applies to all dangerous drugs, not only cannabis. A completed diversion means no charge, no court and nothing on your reportable criminal history. The eligibility rules are set out in full on our drug possession page.

If diversion was not available and you are convicted, everything turns on section 12 of the Penalties and Sentences Act 1992 (Qld). It leaves the recording of a conviction to the discretion of the court, weighed against the seriousness of what you did, your age and character, and what a recorded conviction would do to your ability to earn a living.

On a first small possession with an early plea, walking out without a conviction recorded is realistic. It is not automatic and it is not achieved by asking nicely. It is won with documents: the employment contract requiring a clean check, the visa, the university placement, the licence condition, the letter from an employer. Bring them.