The chief suspect in a celebrity drug ring that was busted last year in New Zealand will spend his bail time in the yacht of a millionaire friend. John Francis Waterworth, a 56-year-old businessman who is facing 28 charges of possessing and supplying drugs, including cocaine, marijuana and methamphetamine, is the alleged “kingpin” behind a drug network that has seen various high-profile public figures in New Zealand implicated. Twelve arrests were originally made between June and October last year as part of Operation Aqua.

Waterworth was granted bail after a court agreed that conditions at his Mt Eden prison weren’t conducive enough for him to prepare for his case that commences on the 28th of September. After being released from prison he had first stayed with a family friend at Clarks Beach in Auckland’s Manukau Harbour, before residents of the small community strenuously objected to his presence. It was then that another friend, Mark Granger, offered up his luxury yacht moored near his apartment in Princes Wharf as lodgings. Jonathan Down, a Crown prosecutor in the case, confirmed the arrangement, adding, “It’s not a good look, I accept, but some of us have rich friends.”

Three other men, Adamu Shazizi Awahdi, Wayne Jeffery Beard and an unnamed businessman from Christchurch, will also be on trial later this year; they have all pleaded not guilty. Public figures embroiled in the case include former rugby union and league star Marc Ellis, who was fined NZ$300 for buying ecstasy, and David Henderson, an Auckland property developer who pleaded guilty to attempting to buy cocaine and received a suspended sentence. Other celebrities who have been implicated but not charged include former rugby league player Brent Todd, former All Black rugby union player Josh Kronfeld and TV personality Lana Coc-Kroft.