Man receives six years for drug, firearm offences

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This article was published 27/09/2023 (1102 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Being found with a combination of drugs and guns has landed a Westman man behind bars for six years.

Riley Yates, 23, was sentenced in a King’s Bench courtroom on Monday after previously pleading guilty to two sets of charges including trafficking methamphetamine and fentanyl out of his Brandon residence and multiple firearms charges.

Both the Crown and defence agreed on the six-year sentence.

Crown attorney Rich Lonstrup read the evidence for the charges in court.

In 2020, Yates was on a bail order that included a condition that police could do checks of his home and searches of his residence. At the time, Yates was in Virden, and in December of that year, police searched his bedroom in a residence he shared with a roommate in Virden. Officers found a backpack containing a sawed-off shotgun and 17 rounds of ammunition.

When Yates learned that police found the backpack, he panicked and ran from officers. Police ran after Yates, until he was eventually blocked by a fence and stopped.

Yates spent the next two years in and out of custody, racking up minor charges.

It wasn’t until January 2023 that Brandon police gathered information that Yates was trafficking meth and fentanyl at his home on Victoria Avenue in Brandon.

On Jan. 25, police raided Yates’ home and arrested him inside the residence.

During a search of the home, police found 33 grams of meth stashed in a clothes dryer. They also found 1.5 grams of fentanyl.

In Yates’ bedroom, drug packaging materials were found as well as score sheets and a digital scale. Multiple weapons were also found inside the home, including a shotgun with a sawed-off stock, a folding knife and a stun gun, which was hidden in a floor air intake vent.

Lonstrup said that Yates had racked up 13 convictions over the last four years, from thefts and assaults to breaches and weapons charges, though this was his first drug conviction.

“Both of these drugs are absolutely devastating [and] the social costs they have inflicted upon our community and many others has been spoken much of,” the Crown attorney said.

“And when you are dealing with someone who is bringing it into the community for profit, literally speaking, they need to be made an example out of — it needs to be reflected in the sentence.”

He was that the combination of both the trafficking level quantity of drugs and the weapons that were found makes the case especially serious.

“We know these weapons have only one purpose: to intimidate, maim or terrorize those who try to thwart a trafficker’s business, often with innocent members of the public,” Lonstrup said.

Yates’ defence lawyer, Bob Harrison, disagreed with Lonstrup’s statement that Yates was trafficking purely for profit.

Harrison said that his 23-year-old client was selling drugs to support his own habit. Yates lost his long-term partner as a result of an overdose in 2020, Harrison said. And though his client has made efforts to get clean and hold a steady job, he fell back on old habits and began to use drugs again.

The defence lawyer said that his client is remorseful for his actions and has made use of his time in custody by taking programming. Harrison said that Yates wants to make a fresh start, and when he’s released from prison, he hopes to get that fresh start on the West Coast.

“Sometimes it’s difficult when you’re young and you build up a reputation in a certain area, so he wants to start fresh,” Harrison said.

“And I think if he works hard, he could certainly do it.”

Yates apologized to the court and said that he takes ownership for all of his actions.

“I apologize to the community of Brandon. I didn’t mean to threaten anybody. This is a chapter of my life that I want to put behind me,” Yates said.

King’s Bench Justice Scott Abel agreed with the recommended sentence of six years. He also sentenced Yates to a lifetime weapons prohibition.

After time served, Yates will spend a little over five years behind bars.

» gmortfield@brandonsun.com

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