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Urban Society founder in jail on drugs charges

Stockbridge

Stockbridge

Sydney entertainment website Urban Society has shut down and staff denied their pre-Christmas pay as founder and manager Lisa Stockbridge was arrested on drugs charges, The Daily Telegraph has reported.

According to the newspaper well-known socialite Lisa Danielle Stockbridge, 41, of Kings Cross, is awaiting trial in a maximum security prison cell as she stands accused of supplying cocaine and ecstasy to clients.

Police arrested Stockbridge on December 11 and recovered $33,620 as they took her into custody, and staff of the entertainment website were later informed they no longer had jobs and would not be paid for the previous week, according to reports.

Stockbridge, who was a senior account manager at Vogue before she founded Urban Society three years ago, is alleged to have supplied cocaine to people in Rose Bay and Woolahra between 4.40pm and 5pm on November 14 and then in Double Bay later that evening, The Telegraph reports.

Police also allege Stockbridge sold cocaine in Darlinghurst, Clovelly and Sydney between November 14 and December 11, and supplied 270g of ecstasy in Darlinghurst between December 11 and 12, according to the report. Stockbridge is also facing a further seven charges of supplying or knowingly taking part in the supply of a prohibited drug and dealing with the proceeds of crime.

Staff told the Telegraph of their shock at the arrest which resulted in a sudden end to their paycheques just before Christmas.

“We had been told she’d hurt her hand at the gym, which is why she wasn’t in the office,” journalist Alex Bruce-Smith told News Corp, maintaining they had only found out she had been arrested the following week, when they also heard they would not be paid for the previous week’s work.

Editor of Urban Society Camilla Gulli posted on her Facebook page that she had resigned after the arrest.

“It is with a heavy heart that I resign as editor of Urban Society, after two-and-a-half long years,” she posted. “Want to say that I love my team, who are some of the most resilient and talented people I know. Goodbye free dinners, I’ll miss you most of all. Hit me up for freelance work.”

Stockbridge is reportedly being held in the maximum security section of Silverwater jail in Sydney while she awaits trial. The matter is back in court on February 20.

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