JUDGE EASES SENTENCE ON MAN WHO SMUGGLED POT TO INMATE

'A Friend Indeed'

VANCOUVER - There is nothing to suggest that marijuana inside prisons
causes any particular harm, a British Columbia Appeal court judge says
in her decision to reduce the sentence of a man caught smuggling the
drug to an incarcerated friend.

Madame Justice Mary Southin, in written reasons for the judgment
released this week, also said that "I infer that the accused committed
this offence because he believes there is some merit in the old adage
that a friend in need is a friend indeed."

Judge Southin decided to allow the appeal of Paul Scott Charlish and
reduce his six-month jail sentence to a four-month conditional
sentence, to be served in the community.

"The learned judge rested on deterrence," she said in her ruling "but
there is nothing in the record that visitors are frequently taking or
attempting to take marijuana into prisons or, for that matter, if
marijuana is getting into prisons, that any particular harm thereby
results."

Charlish, 31, was charged with trafficking marijuana after he was
caught on Aug. 11, 1998, passing 14 grams of pot to his friend, Curtis
Bradley Rabochenko, a prisoner at Matsqui Institution in Abbotsford.

"There is no evidence that this was a commercial transaction," Judge
Southin noted.

Judge Southin noted Charlish had no previous criminal record, works
full-time and had been a friend of Rabochenko since before high
school. The incident occurred in the visitor's room of the prison.