VANCOUVER – An Indo-Canadian man who sold 5,000 fentanyl pills in taxicabs has been sentenced to seven years in jail.
Fentanyl has caused fatal overdoses and killed thousands of people in Vancouver and across Canada.
According to a recent Provincial Court decision, Raymon Singh Ranu came under police surveillance in late 2014 at a home on East 27th Avenue in Vancouver, reported the Georgia Straight newspaper.
An undercover officer was brought in and he faked a drug deal in front of a taxi driver only identified as “Mr. Khan”.
This driver then referred the cop to Ranu.
“On occasion, drugs were provided to the officer by Mr. Ranu,” Judge Nancy Phillips wrote in her decision. “On other occasions, someone else in the taxi handled drugs or money while Mr. Ranu was in the vehicle, or by someone else after Mr. Ranu had negotiated a deal with the officer. Mr. Khan and his taxi cab appear to have been at Mr. Ranu’s beck and call, indicative of financial means and detection avoidance.”
A search warrant was executed on the East 27th Avenue home in February 2015, yielding pleny of drugs, two pistols, and an extended ammunition magazine, reported the Straight.
Phillips concluded that Ranu was “either constructively or jointly in possession of the drugs but not of the weapons”.
Ranu was convicted on 13 counts of trafficking in heroin, fentanyl, and cocaine.
“He was found in possession of money obtained from the sale of drugs and over $1,000,000 in drugs were located in the stash house,” Phillips noted.
“The quantity of the drugs involved show Mr. Ranu was not a low-level drug distributor,” Phillips wrote. “Mr. Ranu made clear to the undercover officer that he was not his only fentanyl customer and he spoke of another client who bought batches of 10,000 pills from him. The 7.87 kilograms of cocaine and just over 2 kilograms of heroin found at the stash house show he was also involved in other drugs in considerable quantities.”
Courtesy Georgia Straight
