Jamil Hopoate, who had played for the Brisbane Broncos, was arrested at gunpoint during a police sting in 2021 after being paid $10,000 by a “stranger” to move slabs of cocaine across Sydney
Hopoate, who had played for the Brisbane Broncos, was arrested at gunpoint during a police sting in 2021 after being paid $10,000 by a “stranger” to move slabs of cocaine across Sydney.
He told a court at the time he did not know who the individual was and never saw him again.
That cocaine supply has now been linked to a cartel, believed to be the Kinahans.
He had been sentenced to a minimum of two years and three months in jail in October 2022, but has now been released, 7News in Australia has reported.
Hopoate – the brother of current NRL players Albert Hopoate and Lehi Hopoate – is living with his father, the Manly Sea Eagles premiership player, John Hopoate.
“He’s good,” Hopoate Snr told News Corp.
A member of the famous ‘Hopoate Family’, Jamil’s NRL career only lasted 12 months when he played for the Brisbane Broncos in the 2020 season before being released.
When sentencing, the judge said Hopoate had no profit stake in the cocaine supply and acted merely as an “expendable” courier.
“There was no evidence he was going to openly distribute any of the drugs into the community,” the judge said.
Before the drug bust that saw him spend over 24 months in prison, he was jailed for a year for a drunken, unprovoked attack on a man outside a local pub in 2014.
He was dumped by Manly Sea Eagles when he was jailed but later given permission to return to NRL in 2020, where he played 12 matches in Brisbane’s sub-par season, mostly off the bench, and was later let go.
Hopoate said in 2022 that he would drink until he dropped, and “alcohol is the devil to me”.
“I get blackouts, I’m either zero or one hundred, sober or pissed (and) when I’m on the piss, I sometimes take Charlie (cocaine) too,” he said, according to 7News.
“I never crave it when I’m sober, I spend whatever money I have on me on the day, it could be hundreds of dollars or thousands.
“Drink turns me into an asshole.”
It has been reported he is “starting to rebuild his life”, with his wife.
She shared a Father’s Day video of herself with Jamil and their daughters at the start of September.
“Celebrating our guy. So grateful, we love you,” she wrote on Instagram.
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