MALAKWA MAN TRYING TO RISE ABOVE CRIMINAL PAST

Special Report: Colin Martin Talks About Life Choices.

Colin Hugh Martin considers himself an honest, responsible,
God-fearing man.

Martin was labeled the ringleader of a Canada-U.S. marijuana smuggling
operation between 1997 and 1999. It ended following a 13-month RCMP
investigation. Of the 17 arrested, including his father Donald and
brother Damyen. Colin was the only one to face a major conviction.

Currently, Martin is facing a U.S. extradition order for his alleged
involvement in a second cross-border drug smuggling operation that was
taken down in 2009 through a Canada-U.S. investigation dubbed
Operation Blade Runner.

Canadian-actor Jason Priestly has bought the rights to film a movie
about Blade Runner and one of the alleged co-conspirators, 24-year-old
Samuel Lindsay-Brown, who hung himself in a Spokane jail after U.S.
Drug Enforcement agents caught him stateside transporting drugs in a
helicopter leased through Martin's Malakwa company, Gorge Timber Ltd.

While he denies any involvement in Blade Runner, Martin will tell you
that Lindsay-Brown might still be alive today if the two had never
met. In fact, Martin is not the least bit reserved when it comes to
talking about his past, from his early dealings with cocaine, to the
drug-smuggling operation he, his father and brother were involved in.

In the Shuswap, Martin's reputation precedes him. He is the notorious
drug dealer from Malakwa. But Martin doesn't get it. To him, this is
all a gross exaggeration.

"It's funny, to look at from my point of view, as far as the celebrity
and the famous drug guy from Malakwa - I don't know the word I'm
looking for," the 37-year-old Martin says over the kitchen table at
his Malakwa home. "It's funny how things can get blown out of
proportion and how easy that seems to happen in the media.

"Some things make a great story and I guess if it wasn't me that they
were talking about, I might think that's a good story."

Martin laughs at the notion of being thought of as some kind of
gangster. A quick look around his home doesn't reveal any signs of a
gangster lifestyle that Hollywood might be interested in. Though
spacious, there are no lavish furnishings to be seen. There are no
fast cars in the driveway (a Dodge Viper he once owned was seized in
1999 when he was charged with possession of proceeds of crime). There
are no firearms sitting around, or stacks of money or wrapped bundles
of suspicious materials. In fact, what stands out most are the
numerous bright children's toys. Martin and partner Jen Cahill have
five children between them. Martin says his kids are his life, and if
there's one lesson he hopes to teach them, it's that one must take
responsibility for their actions.

"Yeah, there might be some people out there that are truly evil
people, but this finger pointing. That's just not who I am," says
Martin. "I am a God-fearing person and I believe that there's going to
be a day that all of us are going to be judged, and all of our
skeletons are going to come out of the closet."

Martin wound up in the Malakwa area with his mom and siblings around
1980 to be with their grandma and grandpa, Hugh and Isabelle Gresham,
who owned and operated the Malakwa cafe.

"We moved in with Grandma and Grandpa, and they ran the restaurant and
us kids peeled the potatoes and filled the pop and pumped the gas - it
was kind of a nice little arrangement really," says Martin.

Later Martin started working in the bush, largely in the shake and
shingle industry. The work was immediately rewarding, and at Grade 8
Martin dropped out of school to be in the bush full time.

"I felt that doing shake and shingles was what I wanted to do in life
and I wanted to get right at it so I quit school," said Martin. "It
was more of a social event. I wasn't there learning anything."

Around the time he was 19, Martin says the NDP government decided to
pull out of funding the shake and shingle industry. This, he says, had
a crippling effect on the community.

"They decided dead standing trees were a better home for the white owl
then they were for us to make a living," said Martin. "So the salvage
program was discontinued and there were hundreds of people looking for
work. Restaurant business went in the toilet, things around here just
dried up."

Those still with permits to harvest wood, including Dave Stead,
suddenly had a deadline to get the work finished. While working for
Stead, Martin partnered with Robbie Muskett. Martin says they were
about two weeks from finishing when Muskett was fatally injured on the
job.

"We were falling the trees, cutting them to length for the helicopter
to lift out," said Martin. "Robbie, I think he was about 23, 24 years
old, and a tree rolled down the bank and squished his head onto a
stump. That was probably the most shocking, horrible experience that's
ever happened in my life. I remember it like it was yesterday."

After this experience, Martin says he could no longer do the work. He
was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress and spent about eight months
on worker's compensation. Martin eventually arranged for a buyout from
the compensation board. He says they paid him $11,000 so that he could
get a pilot's licence. But that pursuit ended when Martin learned his
eyesight wasn't good enough.

Around the same time, Martin began selling and using cocaine. One week
during the three-month period he was using, Martin says he wound up in
hospital on five separate occasions. The experience scared him off the
drug, but did not dissuade him from selling.

"I wish I could say yeah, I wound up in the hospital and at the end of
the day I thought, 'Gee, this is horrible stuff and I shouldn't be
selling this to people.' But that's not the way it was."

Martin's career change, from cocaine peddler to marijuana smuggler,
began one fateful day when his father showed up on his doorstep,
claiming he knew people in Eugene, Oregon who were in the pot
business. Colin said he could get his hands on 10 pounds of pot, and
Donald knew people with property on the Canada-U.S. border they could
move it through. Soon after, with his brother Damyen's help, the three
were successful in smuggling the popular B.C. bud into the States and
made a quick, $30,000 profit.

"It was only 10 pounds, but at the time we were thinking, 'that's a
lot of pot,'" says Martin. "It's strange, but that's how small time it
was and how it really all started."

The operation continued to grow to a point where Martin was pulling in
about $200,000 a week. And, despite the incredible risks involved, it
was work he was more comfortable with.

"I thought this is great," said Martin. "This is much less stress than
dealing cocaine."

In 2004, Donald and Damyen were sentenced to terms of house arrest
after pleading guilty of conspiring to export marijuana to the U.S.
Colin says he also pleaded guilty, seeking the same punishment. Two
years later he was found guilty on eight counts of money laundering,
conspiracy to traffic in drugs, conspiracy to export drugs and
possession of proceeds of crime. He was later sentenced to
two-and-a-half years in prison but, with an appeal still before the
court, has yet to serve time.

As for the U.S. extradition order, Martin has no intention of going
back to the U.S. anytime soon. He maintains the only reason his name
is in a U.S. court indictment is because of a series of brief
exchanges he had with U.S. Drug Enforcement agents, beginning in
September 2009, where he was attempting to demonstrate to CBC
reporters the agency's willingness to "get in bed with the bad guys."

While he recognizes there are indeed bad guys involved in the
drug-smuggling business, Martin doesn't include himself among them.
When he hears that people are afraid of him, of who he is and what
he's done, Martin says it hurts him deeply.

"There are people out there who are involved in this industry who are
not these monsters the cops would like you to believe," says Martin.
"They are normal people just like you and me. I feel I'm a pretty
normal person. Maybe it's just because I've been at this so long I've
become numb to what's going on."

To one end of Martin's 30-acre property sits a spacious yet near-empty
workshed. On one side of the shed is a gravel pit Martin hopes will
become profitable as his competitors in the area start running out of
product. To the other side runs a creek on which he hopes to establish
an independent power project. He says the plans are already before the
province for approval. But Martin is reserved about both projects,
admitting past attempts at going legit have been challenging at best.

Asked if he is still somehow involved in the drug trade, Martin says
he knows people who are involved and who sometimes come to him seeking
advice. After a long pause, he admits it has been a pretty big part of
his life - and not an easy one to shake.

"I just want to be right up front, but then there's the other side of
me that says you need to watch what you say. You do have kids who rely
on you. I'm an honest person. I would not sit here and look you in the
eyes and tell you I'm a perfect, law abiding citizen. Do I break the
law? Sure I do. That's all I have to say on that."