A "mid-level" drug dealer was sentenced to 28 months in prison for drug trafficking offences in Chilliwack.
The sentencing of Tammi Ann Wood by Provincial Court Judge Michael Fortino was on June 16 in Chilliwack, following Wood's guilty plea for possession of fentanyl, a "particularly harmful" fentanyl/benzo mix called etizolam, cocaine and methamphetamine, for the purpose of trafficking in June 2024.
Crown advocated a three-year jail sentence for Wood while defence counsel sought a conditional sentencing order for two years less a day to be served in the community instead.
Wood was arrested in Chilliwack in March 2021 for drug trafficking offences, and she was found with 5.54 grams of fentanyl, 4.68 grams of fentanyl-etizolam mixture, 23.48 grams of cocaine, and 254.26 grams of methamphetamine.
The combined street value of the drugs in her possession was estimated between $7,450 and $11,620, the court said.
Her car contained $310 cash, score sheets and a baseball bat. Inside Wood's purse was $1,810 cash, 1.82 grams of cocaine, additional score sheets and a scale containing cocaine, fentanyl, benzodiazepine, and methamphetamine residue.
But the issue that made Wood's offences "objectively more grave" Judge Fortino underlined in his reasons for sentence, was the trafficking of the "particularly harmful" mixture of fentanyl and benzodiazepines in the form of "etizolam."
"Government documents warn that fentanyl mixed with benzodiazepines such as etizolam is particularly harmful because the benzodiazepine counters the effects of naloxone, a substance used to reverse the effects of opioids, thereby increasing the user’s risk of fatal drug poisoning," Fortino said.
The judge cited the etizolam possession among the aggravating factors for sentencing because it presents an "even greater potential for life-threatening consequences" than just fentanyl on its own.
"Ms. Wood was either wilfully blind or indifferent to the enhanced risk this mixture presented the end-user, or, she possessed this mixture knowing of the enhanced risk.
"Either way, I find her possession of it to be significantly aggravating and demonstrates a substantial indifference on Ms. Wood’s part to the human lives she was prepared to put at risk through her willingness to traffic in it."
The drug dealing had a "considerable impact" on the community since the proliferation of fentanyl onto the streets has "brought an unprecedented level of destruction to human lives, along with social disorder, economic consequences and detrimental impacts on social services," Judge Fortino said.
He also made note of Wood’s involvement in mixing and packaging the drugs.
"The search of Ms. Wood’s home revealed that she was much more than an unsophisticated street level trafficker.
"She was very much a mid-level trafficker," the judge noted, as contrasted with a street level dealer.
"The analysis of the bowls, utensils and scales, along with the presence of the 'cooking instructions' and drug mixture ratios satisfies me that Ms. Wood was, in fact, involved in the cutting and blending of the product she was possessing for the purpose of trafficking."
Wood's defence had argued that her personal circumstances, along with her post offence "pro-social" lifestyle supported the idea that a conditional sentence would be appropriate, and that "permitting her to serve it in the community would not endanger the community."
Wood's cellphone was also seized upon her arrest. It contained texts about mixing fentanyl with etizolam and other cutting agents "to reduce production costs."
After she was arrested and a search warrant was executed at her Chilliwack residence, police seized an Interac machine, invoices for 'Tammi’s Terrific Dawgs' a food-cart business, a money counter, more score sheets, and several scales – one of which contained cocaine and fentanyl residue.
The bedroom was reinforced and police were required to break down the door to gain entry.
"Inside the bedroom police located 9.91 grams of methamphetamine, additional score sheets, “cook instructions” addressed to “Tam” and several containers holding methamphetamine with a combined weight of 55.93 grams. In the laundry room, police found mixing bowls, spoons, and utensils contaminated with fentanyl and etizolam residue.
Crown did not file a formal impact statement about the effects of fentanyl.
"However, I am prepared to take judicial notice of the deadly impact of the opioid epidemic on communities throughout British Columbia, and Chilliwack in particular," Fortino wrote in his reasons. "It is nearly impossible to move about the downtown core of Chilliwack without witnessing someone in the throes of their opioid addiction: actually consuming, or having recently consumed illicit substances and existing in a catatonic-like state, folded in half.
"When they consume fentanyl, the user takes a significant risk as even a modest dose can result in death."
The opioid crisis has been plaguing B.C. communities for years with no end in sight.
"Despite the criminal justice system bearing witness to the tragedies presented by the toxic drug crisis for over a decade now, and the significant amount of judicial ink spilled outlining its deleterious impacts, the illicit drug trade and the toxic drug crisis it perpetuates continues to plague our communities."
The judge found "that the trafficking of illicit drugs in this community has a serious, significant and ongoing impact" on the community and that Ms. Wood "played a role in this by contributing to it through her offending."
The pre-sentencing report outlined relevant circumstances of Wood life from exposure to alcoholism as a child to cocaine use, to suffering domestic violence.
"Ms. Wood identified her own substance use along with the instability in her life and her negative peer associates as being factors in her offending. She regrets her behaviour and told the court she “understands the serious nature of the offences she committed.”
Her counsel noted that “having lost her brother to a drug overdose, she should have known better than to get involved.”
Following her arrest, Wood moved to Penticton where she lives with her niece and her children, operates a food truck and has not engaged in further criminal behaviour.
Wood's guilty plea was seen as a mitigating factor as was her "pro-social post-offence lifestyle," in terms of being law abiding.
"I recognize that a person’s exposure to addiction and instability in their formative years can influence their decision-making in later years.
"That being said, while I find that Ms. Wood’s moral culpability is somewhat diminished by the adverse childhood experiences she had, along with the series of unhealthy relationships that likely lead to her consuming and abusing illicit substances, I am not satisfied that her personal circumstances, background and substance misuse rises to the extent it appreciably reduces her moral culpability for this offence."
Wood knew the devastating impact of drug-poisonings, and as such Fortino found that she "must have known that what she was doing was both morally and legally wrong and incredibly dangerous, yet she made the conscious decision to do it anyway."
Further, the judge did not believe she was selling solely to finance her own addiction.
"Instead, she not only sold the deadly drugs, but was involved in the mixing and cutting of them, with their ultimate destination being the streets and the vulnerable population who uses them.
"The danger her offending posed was made even greater by her willingness to traffic fentanyl mixed with etizolam, a mixture seemingly created to reduce production costs."
Her own substance use did not reduce her moral culpability by much.
"I further note that she has taken no steps to address her substance misuse or addiction through counselling or treatment in the years following her arrest. If her substance misuse influenced her decision to traffic in deadly substances for profit, then the risk she poses to the community remains at least, in part, unaddressed."
The judge said her moral culpability for this very serious offence is "considerably high" and he noted that "a proportionate sentence must reflect this."
"Having regard to the offence Ms. Wood is being sentenced for committing, along with her own circumstances, her high moral culpability, the aggravating and mitigating factors present in this case along with the purpose, principles and objectives of sentencing, I find that a fit, just and proportionate sentence is one of 28-months imprisonment.
"I find this sentence adequately balances the gravity of the offence along with Ms. Wood’s moral blameworthiness."
