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SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
A first-time drug dealer said "sorry" Monday for three months of taking phone orders for marijuana, and pleaded guilty to a charge of possession of marijuana for the purpose of trafficking.

He will be sentenced Thursday in territorial court to jail time or house arrest or some combination of those. The Crown withdrew a charge of trafficking, which could have drawn a maximum life sentence.

"I'm sorry," the offender said when Judge Robert Gorin asked if he had anything to say after a pre-sentence report described him as unrepentant.

He called his arrest "a wake-up call; I'll accept whatever happens."

The pre-sentence report said the 22-year-old was self-medicating with two marijuana joints a day when he was laid off from his job as a plumber and started selling the drug to cover his living expenses.

Any profits went to support his preference for marijuana over the prescription drugs for AVHD-audiovisual hyperactivity disorder that "put him in a haze," said lawyer Jay Bran.

Arguments over the man's self-medication broke the family apart, Bran said. His father goes away to work two weeks at a time and he sees his mother about once a month.

Bran said his client has a new job and asked Gorin for a sentence of six months house arrest, an order for abstinence from drugs and alcohol, and counselling, to be followed by probation and 120 hours of community work.

"He has a new job that keeps him busy, and a new lifestyle is keeping him balanced. He's taking positive steps to deal with issues. Things have got a lot more positive for him," said Bran, adding that an NWT court previously sentenced a first-time marijuana dealer to six months of house arrest.

Crown Attorney Duane Praught urged Judge Gorin to send a "strong message that crime does not pay," and argued for four to six months in jail, followed by six months of house arrest.

"Drug purveyors prey on the weakest in society," Praught said, reminding the judge that the man was involved in drugs for a profit; he sold indiscriminately to a stranger.

"The justice system must add its voice to public outrage," he said.

Gorin wondered if the sale that ended in arrest last March on the approach road to Kam Lake "could indicate a lack of sophistication."

Tipped by an informant who supplied the number for the novice dealer's Blackberry, police sent a series of text messages that set up the sale of a quarter pound of marijuana for $1,000 that the dealer said cost him $950.

They arranged a meeting near the Yellowknife airport but the dealer was spooked when he saw police in an unmarked car and moved the sale to the Kam Lake road.

Police searched his phone records and found text messages about sales ranging from a few a grams to half-kilos of marijuana, but they did not estimate how much marijuana he might have dealt during the three months he was in business.

Gorin said he needed to consider the arguments. He is scheduled to deliver the sentence at 1 p.m. Thursday.

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