Court Briefs
Repeat drunk driver busted again
Kirsten Fenn
Northern News Services
Wednesday, December 7, 2016
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
A man suspended from driving for nine years due to his lengthy rap sheet for impaired driving is getting more jail time and driving restrictions after being caught drinking and driving while suspended - again.
Jack Gabriel Walker, 35, was sentenced to 111 days in jail - nearly four months - and is now prohibited from driving until 2027. The sentence was handed down by Judge Christine Gagnon in territorial court Friday.
Walker was sentenced for six charges that included driving with an excessive blood alcohol concentration and driving while disqualified on Nov. 23, 2014, breaching court-imposed conditions on Feb. 15, 2015, driving while disqualified and breaching conditions on May 4, 2016 and breaching conditions again on July 27, 2016.
RCMP pulled Walker over in downtown Yellowknife on Nov. 23, 2014 as officers suspected he was drinking and recalled he was prohibited from driving. Walker had been sentenced to a year in jail earlier that February upon conviction for numerous offences, including a dangerous hit-and-run while impaired.
Judge Bernadette Schmaltz also banned him from driving for seven years on top of the two-year ban he was already serving.
Walker had four impaired driving convictions to his name at the time.
Yellowknifer couldn't determine when he was released from jail prior to the Nov. 23, 2014 incident. He blew two breath samples of 120 milligrams and 110 milligrams - above the legal alcohol limit of 80 milligrams per 100 milliliters of blood.
Walker then broke conditions not to communicate with a woman in February 2015. In May 2016, RCMP stopped Walker in a vehicle again at Gitzel Street and 50 Avenue while he was disqualified from driving.
That July, he breached curfew conditions.
Walker told the courtroom on Friday that he was sorry for everyone he had hurt and took responsibility for the charges.
"Within a couple years, alcohol really affected me," Walker said, adding he had addressed his alcohol issues through the wellness court program.
Gagnon said she considered Walker's participation in the program an important mitigating factor in his sentence and hoped he had learned from it.
Cocaine dealer gets 27 months in jail
A 25-year-old man who pleaded guilty to the possession of cocaine and other drugs for the purpose of trafficking was sentenced to 27 months in jail by a territorial court judge on Monday morning.
Yellowknife resident Lincoln Prescott was seen leaning against the side of the prisoner's box with his face against his hand while dressed in a grey hoodie as Judge Robert Gorin read his sentence. Prescott was charged with possession for the purpose of trafficking, breaking and entering, careless storage of ammunition and failing to attend a court appearance for crimes committed in Alberta. He later had the charges transferred so they could be heard in Yellowknife.
Last January, police discovered Prescott with 60 grams of cocaine, five cellphones, one gram of cannabis resin and 30 grams of marijuana while executing a search warrant at a home in Lethbridge. On March 25, Prescott broke into the garage of a Lethbridge residence where police found him with the keys to another man's vehicle and two 12-gauge Winchester shotgun shells. He then failed to show up in court for the incident. Gorin handed Prescott two years for possession of the drugs, plus three months for the break and enter. Prescott is also required to pay a fine of $500 for failing to appear in court and faces a 10-year firearms prohibition, followed by a lifetime ban on certain firearms.
Prescott was one of eight people charged with drug-related offences after Yellowknife RCMP raided homes on Con Road and Jeske Court in September 2015. The charges against Prescott were later abandoned due to a lack of evidence. RCMP had been investigating a drug trafficking network operating in the city and discovered cocaine, thousands of dollars in cash, firearms, ammunition, knives and machetes.