An American who transported just over 14kgof cannabis into Ireland in order to pay off a debt has been jailed for five years.Ulises Mendez (30) had flown in from Chicago in January and left his contact details with airport staff when he found his suitcase had gone missing. When the luggage showed up, a scan revealed an anomaly and a search of it revealed several black packages wrapped in t-shirts.The packages were found to be 14.4kg of cannabis with an estimated street value of €242,516.Mendez returned to the airport the following day but instead of collecting his luggage, attempted to get a flight back to the US. He was arrested and brought in for questioning and has been remanded in custody since.Mendez with an address of North New Hope Street, Santa Ana, California, was brought forward to Dublin Circuit Criminal Court on signed pleas of guilty from the District Court. He pleaded guilty to having the drugs in his possession for sale or supply at Dublin Airport on January 11th, 2026. He has no previous convictions. Garda Emmet O’Byrne told Tessa White, prosecuting, that Mendez made full admissions when questioned by gardaí.O’Byrne agreed with Kevin McCrave, defending, that Mendez told gardaí he had owed $3,000 (€2,600) but when he went to repay the debt he was told he would have to take on this role instead.It was accepted that he claimed he had been told “this would clear his debt if he carried out this task” and further accepted Mendez was effectively “acting as a courier”.McCrave said his client had worked previously in warehouse, construction and security roles but due to his Mexican heritage he later found it difficult to secure further employment in the US. He accepted his client had been aware he was bringing drugs into Ireland but said he had believed cannabis was legal here.McCrave asked the court to take into consideration his client’s lack of previous convictions, his admissions and his early guilty plea.He handed in a letter of apology to the court and suggested Mendez was a person “down on his luck” that there was “an element of pressure” applied to him and he felt he had no alternative but to get involved.Judge Martin Nolan said Mendez had incurred some debts and was put upon to do this work.“He acquiesced to the pressure and that was a huge misjudgement,” the judge said.He accepted Mendez was obviously acting as a courier and he was going to get some kind of material award for his role.The judge said he had taken into account Mendez’s plea, co-operation, the fact he was at the lower end of this drug-dealing enterprise and his previous good record and said he was satisfied he was unlikely to come before the courts again.“He was a mature man who made a very, very bad decision,” Nolan said before he jailed Mendez for five years and backdated the sentence to when he was first remanded in custody in January.