had taken the blame, faced the music in Magistrates' Court yesterday.

Quinton Eugene Wade received two and a half years in prison after taking the high road and turning himself in to Police in May, admitting he was the owner of $7,656 worth of cocaine found in a Happy Valley Road home. Wade also confessed the cocaine was for supply.

The 35-year-old Southampton man confessed after another man had already admitted to the crime.

Crown prosecutor Larry Mussenden told the court that narcotics officers last May had conducted a raid on the home of a man on Happy Valley Road and that while carrying out that search, discovered 24.5 grams of 76-percent pure cocaine. The drugs were contained in a clear plastic bag and hidden in a fuse box in the washroom of the house.

According to Wade's lawyer Mark Pettingill, the man who first admitted the drugs were his did so only after Police arrested members of his family. Mr.

Pettingill said the man had originally claimed to know nothing about the drugs.

Holding that the courts need to send a strong message to the public on drug offences, and in particular cocaine, Mr. Mussenden asked that Wade be incarcerated for three years. Five years or a $10,000 fine or both is the maximum that can be meted out in the lower court for the offence.

Mr. Pettingill pointed out the "uniqueness'' of the case.

"This is a novel situation your honour, and it is the first time in my experience that someone has come forward to confess a crime that someone else has already admitted to,'' he said.

Telling Senior Magistrate Will Francis that his client is truly repentant and wants to "clear his slate'', Mr. Pettingill argued that Mr. Francis should "bend as far backward as possible'' in handing down his sentence so as to reward Wade for his "exceptional'' action.