Murray Wood: Who's hot... and who's not
Every Friday, Murray Wood takes a look at the week's news and decides who's hot... and who's not. This week's list inclu...
The RCMP’s Roving Traffic Unit had a busy time near Kindersley recently, but not only with traffic.
Officers made three drug busts after stopping vehicles on Highway 7 on April 17 and April 18.
On April 17, a 37-year-old man from Summerland, B.C., was charged after 207 grams of cannabis was discovered in his vehicle.
That same day, an officer who stopped a vehicle became suspicious of drug possession after his interactions with the driver. A police service dog was deployed and determined there were drugs in the vehicle, so the driver was arrested and a search was conducted.
The search found 61 grams of cannabis, 31 grams of cannabis shatter and $7,000 hidden in the vehicle. The driver, a 40-year-old male from Saskatoon, is facing charges under the Cannabis Act and with possession of proceeds of crime.
On April 18, a vehicle was stopped for a seatbelt violation. The officers saw behaviour from the occupants that was consistent with drug possession and the two men were arrested.
A subsequent search of the vehicle turned up four 29-gram packages — two containing cocaine and two containing what is believed to be a substance used in the production of crack cocaine. The search also found more than a kilogram of crystal methamphetamine that police say could be turned into 10,000 doses.
“When you figure 10,000 people could be affected by this amount of drugs, it’s a significant seizure,” RCMP Cpl. Rob King said during a media conference Wednesday.
King said meth is still a problem in Saskatchewan, but police are fighting it.
“With significant seizures like this, we’re making it less attractive for the person that’s dealing (meth), and for the person that’s capitalizing on someone else’s addiction,” King said.
A 25-year-old man and a 23-year-old man, both from Calgary, have been charged with possession of a controlled substance for the purpose of trafficking.
King said it’s difficult to say how many routine traffic stops result in drug seizures, but he suggested it would be a “small percentage.”
In King’s mind, the fact that all three stops were on Highway 7 didn’t mean that road has become a favourite for traffickers.
“Routes are changing all the time,” he said. “We want to try to be on all the routes and try to make these seizures and to make this as least attractive a business to be in as possible.”
— With files from 980 CJME’s Lisa Schick
