Drug trafficking problem is on a rise in Canada for the last couple of years. In some case Canada citizens involved in drug trafficking and smuggling, but recent international court hearing caught press attention – Citizen of Canada is sentenced to death for drug smuggling in China
Canadian Foreign Minister Hristia Freeland stated that Ottawa requested a pardon for Canadian citizen Robert Lloyd Schellenberg, who was sentenced to death in China for smuggling methamphetamine.
“We have already talked to the ambassador of China in Canada and asked for pardon. Canada’s position on the estimated sentence has not changed for a very long time. Canada has no death penalty, we believe that it is inhuman and unacceptable. The Canadian government always opposes the death penalty, especially when this option is considered or applied to Canadian citizens, ”said Freeland.
On November 20th, 2018, the Dalian Middle Stage Court sentenced Schellenberg to 15 years in prison, and also decided to confiscate 150,000 yuan and expel him from the country. However, the Canadian filed an appeal. In December, the province’s highest court held a public hearing.
At the meeting, the prosecutor called the sentence, in which the accused was recognized as an accomplice, and the act itself was qualified as an attempt to commit the crime as inappropriate. The court decided to return the case for retrial. Prosecutors supplemented it with new facts. For trial formed a new panel of judges.
The court now decided that the defendant and his accomplices smuggled 222.035 kilograms of methamphetamine into international organized criminal activity. In accordance with the Criminal Code of China, taking into account the degree of public danger of a crime, Schellenberg was sentenced to death. The defendant has ten days to appeal the verdict.
In our own Winnipeg drugs and methamphetamine especially is a constantly growing issue. Winnipeg authorities started a full-scale investigation into city`s meth problem. As per Winnipeg Police, there is a spike in meth-related crime incidents, like property theft, residential break-ins, unreasonable anger towards each other (meth users) and other people around them, violent attacks, some ending up in lethal outcomes for victims.