JUDGE WISHES HE COULD HAVE JAILED MAN OVER GROW-OP

Law Should Provide A Deterrent, He Says

A West Vancouver man has been handed a conditional sentence with
house arrest for his role in a 362-plant marijuana grow-op.

Provincial Court Judge Doug Moss said he'd have liked to have sent
Warren William Spencer, 24, to jail, but legal precedents prevented
him from doing so.

Spencer, who pleaded guilty, was given a 12-month conditional
sentence and 12 months of probation.

"No community in the province of British Columbia is immune from the
curse of the grow-operation," Moss wrote in his June 13 judgment.

"To date, the imposition of conditional jail sentences and fines, and
even house forfeiture, have not served in any real way to deter
generally people of like mind to Mr. Spencer from involving
themselves in this illegal activity."

A house in the 1400-block Palmerston Avenue, rented by labourer
Spencer, was raided by West Vancouver police on Sept. 13, 2005.
Officers seized growing equipment -- and the 362 pot plants -- which
they said was capable of producing 31 kilograms of weed with a street
value of up to $170,000.

After his arrest, Spencer said greed wasn't his motivation. He said
he was out to satisfy his and his friends' need for weed -- a claim
Moss said "obviously must be taken with a grain of salt."

Moss said the problem of sentencing is a difficult one. "One of the
problems facing provincial courts in particular is how best to
address the growing problem, pardon the pun, of sentencing those
convicted of cultivation of marijuana," Moss wrote.

"The number of such cases appears to be growing rapidly in North/West
Vancouver and all communities in British Columbia, regardless of the
use of conditional jail sentences and fines. Actual jail is rapidly
becoming a more realistic penalty if the conduct is to be deterred.

"As a judge who deals daily with such offences, I support
Parliament's intention as reflected in the Criminal Code to send
fewer people to jail for first offences in particular. There are some
kind of criminal offences, however, which would seem well suited to
the general effect of deterrence through actual jail sentences."

Department of Justice officials didn't return calls.