Mounties estimate value at $40,000
Kevin Wilson
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Apr 20/01) - Alberta RCMP, in conjunction with their counterparts in Yellowknife, have made two cocaine seizures totalling more than six ounces of the illicit substance.
Mounties say the drug seizures took place in Indian Cabins, Alberta, and in Yellowknife.
Police believe the coke seized in Alberta was destined for Yellowknife.
The investigation yielded the arrest of one person on April 12.
A 22 year-old from Leduc, Alberta has been charged with trafficking in cocaine and possession of cocaine for the purpose of trafficking.
He is scheduled to appear in an Alberta court May 3.
Yellowknife Mounties estimate the value of the seized cocaine to be approximately $40,000 on the streets of Yellowknife.
Another Guiness conviction
The Operation Guiness drug bust juggernaut just keeps on rolling.
Hardy Sangris of Yellowknife was sentenced to 90 days imprisonment and a $1000 fine after pleading guilty to one charge of trafficking narcotics.
Sangris will serve his sentence intermittently and has four months to pay the fine.
Court heard that Sangris sold an ounce of marijuana to a civilian informant in the parking lot of Weaver and Devore last March.
The informant asked Sangris to "hook me up" again the following day to which Sangris replied, "No problem".
In passing sentence, Judge Michel Bourassa noted that Sangris had a previous conviction for trafficking and two priors for simple possession. Sangris, said Bourassa, made "a cold calculating decision," to sell drugs.
With the marijuana trafficking convictions of Sangris and David Stuparyk, the total number of individuals convicted as a result of last year's Guiness sting has climbed to 28. Several Guiness-related cases remain before the court and four individuals with arrest warrants are still at large.
According to the RCMP, sentences have ranged from fines to up to four years imprisonment.
Guilty plea in sex case
Yellowknifer Peter Charles Tsetta had a change of heart and changed his plea of not guilty to guilty on three charges of sexual assault Thursday.
The charges had been laid last November.
No details of the case were spoken to in court, as a pre-sentencing report is being prepared.
The facts of the case will be entered when Tsetta is sentenced May 29.
