WOMAN JAILED FOR ROLE IN DRUG RING

Police See Increasing Trafficking And Smuggling By Females With Gang
Links

A North Vancouver woman was handed a five-year sentence in Seattle
Friday for her role in a cross-border drug smuggling ring.

Krysta Edwards, 23, is one of an increasing number of young B.C. women
getting caught in drug rings linked to gangs and organized crime.

Nor are the courts cutting them slack because of their
gender.

U.S. District Court Judge Richard A. Jones noted the hundreds of
thousands of ecstasy-like pills Edwards brought into the country
saying, "Think of how many lives you impacted with the number of pills
you brought in. That could have been the first step for that young
person on a lifetime of addiction."

Sgt. Shinder Kirk, of the Gang Task Force, said Friday that B.C. women
linked to gangs and trafficking are facing the same consequences as
men.

"Now anyone associated to or on the periphery of gangs is potentially
at risk regardless of gender," Kirk said. "Increasingly, women have
been at the forefront of many cases, particularly in cases of
trafficking and narcotics smuggling. More importantly, the paradigm
that somehow woman were not to be included or targeted in the violence
has shifted."

Edwards struck a plea bargain with the U.S. Attorney last fall,
admitting she was part of a conspiracy bringing drugs across the
border from Canada, storing them in Washington state, and then taking
them by train to the Chicago and Detroit areas for
distribution.

Canadian co-defendant Maksim Maiburov had crossed into the U.S. some
41 times between August 2008 and April 2009, travelling to Chicago on
Amtrak 26 times.

Edwards made a dozen trips across the border into Washington state
during the same time period and crossed the border in tandem with
another conspirator, Nen Cruces.

The young woman had been given a Ford Explorer with a hidden
compartment in December 2008, and began smuggling loads of about
50,000 pills each across the border. The product was BZP, which is
illegal in the U.S., though not yet banned in Canada. It has similar
effects to ecstasy.

Maiburov also pleaded guilty and was released pending his sentencing.
But last Boxing Day, he was charged with assault in Vancouver after
allegedly boarding a transit bus and assaulting the driver. He is due
back at the Vancouver community Court on that charge April 1.

In part because of the new charge, the U.S. Attorney filed a motion to
withdraw Maiburov's plea agreement. He has missed several U.S. court
appearances, including his own sentencing which was set for Feb. 25.

Edwards filed a sentencing memo explaining her circumstances, but her
lawyer asked that it be sealed because if it were made public it
"could result in irreparable harm to the defendant and her family."
The court granted the sealing request.

Assistant United States Attorney Kate Crisham noted that Edwards
played a larger role in the conspiracy than a low-level courier.
"Edwards appears to have been an involved and highly respected member
of this conspiracy. In addition to the significant amount of drugs she
was entrusted with smuggling across the border [50,000 pills per
trip], Edwards was also entrusted with picking up drug proceeds,"
Crisham said in her sentencing memo.