18 years for Manitoba’s largest fentanyl bust: Court of Appeal

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This article was published 28/12/2024 (337 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Manitoba’s highest court has ordered a Toronto man serve 18 years in prison for the province’s largest ever fentanyl bust after Crown prosecutors successfully argued a shorter sentence did not fit the severity of the crime.

Mandeep Deol, who’s in his mid-40s, was found guilty in the Court of King’s Bench of possessing about 26 kilograms of fentanyl and 50 kg methylenedioxyamphetamine (MDA) for the purposes of trafficking in a bust outside Brandon in July 2020. Some of the fentanyl was laced with benzodiazepines. He was couriering the drugs from Vancouver to Ontario.

Deol was given 14 years for possessing the deadly opioid in August last year.

Crown prosecutors Judith Kliewer and Kathryn Henley appealed the sentence, arguing the Court of Appeal should set a sentencing range for fentanyl couriers, who have no decision-making power, to be 16-to-20 years.

They also argued the court should increase Deol’s sentence to 22 years, as 14 years was unfit.

The prosecutors argued the sentencing judge failed to determine an appropriate sentence, imposed a sentence that was not proportional and did not serve to deter such crimes and denounce them, and failed to appreciate that the particularly deadly fentanyl should be considered an aggravating factor — something which makes the crime worse — in itself.

Court of Appeal Justice Anne Turner, writing on behalf of the court in a November decision, said an appropriate sentencing range for a fentanyl courier is 12-to-18 years, and varied Deol’s sentence to 18 years.

“The significant dangers that fentanyl poses to the community mean that the gravity of the offence is extremely high,” Turner said in the decision, which was also signed by Chief Justice Marianne Rivoalen and Justice Janice leMaistre.

“The undisputed fact that this was the largest seizure of fentanyl in Manitoba and one of the largest seizures in Canada also speaks to the extremely high seriousness of the fentanyl offence.”

On July 28, 2020, Deol was driving a rented van heading eastbound on the Trans-Canada Highway when he was pulled over near Brandon. He had rented the van at Toronto’s airport days before, drove to Vancouver where he picked up the drugs, then turned right around back to Ontario.

Police stopped the vehicle because it was speeding about 12 km/h over the posted speed limit. After pulling the van over, the officer noticed an open bottle of booze in the back seat.

The officer searched the van for more open bottles of liquor, and finding none, told the driver he could keep the whisky in the back of the van.

Police then opened the van’s rear hatch and noticed two bulging hockey bags, which were full of the illicit drugs.

Deol provided no motive for his crimes to police or the courts and offered no remorse for people addicted to the drugs he couriered — or who fatally overdosed on fentanyl.

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca