Mark Chikarovski, the son of former NSW Liberal Party leader Kerry Chikarovski, was back in Sydney's Downing Centre District Court on Friday after admitting he ran a lucrative drug business based on the dark web.
He was arrested in May 2023 and eventually pleaded guilty to a string of drug charges, admitting to supplying drugs online under the username "AusCokeKing" in exchange for cryptocurrency.
Police found large quantities of drugs when they arrested Mark Chikarovski at a Sydney unit complex. (HANDOUT/NSW POLICE)
Officers found large quantities of cocaine, MDMA and methamphetamine, as well as $269,000 worth of cryptocurrency, when they arrested him at an apartment complex at Bondi Junction in Sydney's east.
Chikarovski claimed he sold the substances to pay off debts he incurred funding his own drug habit.
But prosecutors said that was inconsistent with his lavish lifestyle, which involved him buying multimillion-dollar properties and two Porsches, as well as sending his children to an expensive private school.
Chikarovski bought an $11.5 million property in Vaucluse in February 2023 and two weeks later sold another in Bellevue Hill for $12.5 million.
Prosecutors argued the millions of dollars he gained on the Bellevue Hill house could have easily covered the alleged $150,000 he owed dealers.
Chikarovski was sprung wearing gloves and packaging cocaine and MDMA into envelopes ready to post when officers arrested him.
He did a number of drug deals with an undercover police officer, the first coming four days after he bought his Vaucluse pad.
Police said the 38-year-old received cryptocurrency in exchange for prohibited drugs on thousands of occasions since 2017.
Chikarovski used the dark web as what prosecutors termed "an online shopfront", regularly promoting his drugs as "premium European-imported MDMA" and "premium-grade cocaine".
Barrister Phillip Boulton SC, who previously argued his client's upbringing with his mother in the public light had affected him negatively, admitted Chikarovski's decision-making was "stupid".
But he argued a series of mental impairments reduced his moral culpability for the offending.
"The fact is he was under the burden of ADHD, trauma-based anxiety disorder, distortion in his personality traits and different parts of substance abuse," Mr Boulton said.
Dealing drugs, rather than downsizing his house or selling a car, was done to prevent his family knowing about his own usage, the barrister added.
Chikarovski's mother led the NSW Liberal Party from 1999 to 2002 as the state's first female opposition leader.
Judge Jane Culver is set to sentence Chikarovski on Friday afternoon.
