DRUG runner Aaron Underwood was fooled into believing that the pills he tried to bring into the island were Ecstasy. In fact the 21-year-old was carrying nothing more than caffeine tablets.

But he is still facing four-and-a-half years in prison after pleading guilty to conspiring with others to import drugs.

Underwood, from Surrey, was stopped by Customs at the airport when he arrived from Gatwick on 27 April.

The Royal Court heard that he was questioned and later searched after an Ion scan on his bag and its contents proved positive for the presence of cocaine on a pair of jeans.

A scan discovered that Underwood had 402 pink coloured tablets concealed internally in two condoms.

Tests later revealed that the tablets contained caffeine mixed with at least one other compound, which could not be identified.

If the tablets had been Ecstasy they would have carried a street value in Guernsey of up to £8,004.

In interview, Underwood told officers that he ‘knew’ the tablets were Ecstasy because the man who gave them to him had told him so.

He knew this man only as ‘T’. He and a friend who now lives in Guernsey had got chatting to him in a Hammersmith nightclub.

‘T’ asked him if he would be interested in taking something ‘over there’ for him because he knew people in the island.

Underwood was told that on his arrival in Guernsey he was to go and meet an unknown person at a hotel and exchange the drugs for money.

He claimed he did not know how much he was to receive, but that he believed it would be a considerable amount which would help him pay off a number of bills.

Underwood’s advocate, David Domaille, submitted that because the drugs were not Ecstasy they would not have added to the island’s stock of drugs.

Lt-Bailiff Russell Finch said he had taken this into consideration, as he had done in the case of two brothers in late 2006 when they, too, attempted to bring in what they believed to be a large quantity of Ecstasy.

But Mr Finch told the court that what Underwood believed he was bringing into Guernsey was a class A drug.

He was doing so unlawfully and working with others for personal gain.

Underwood had previous convictions for the cultivation of cannabis and for possession of cannabis in the UK, he added.

Crown Advocate Graeme McKerrell asked for destruction of the caffeine tablets, which was granted.