HELLS ANGEL'S SENTENCE FOR DRUG CRIMES QUADRUPLED

Trial Judge Didn't Factor In Damage To Community, Appeal Court
Rules

The B. C. Court of Appeal on Thursday rejected a light sentence for a
convicted Hells Angel drug dealer, hitting him with four times the
jail time and criticizing the trial judge's " piecemeal" approach to
sentencing.

The court ruled that Justice Peter Leask erred when he failed to take
into account the damage done to the community by drugs distributed in
a scheme involving John Virgil Punko.

The appeal court increased Punko's sentence from 14 months to five
years and two months.

RCMP Insp. Gary Shinkaruk, the officer in charge of the investigation,
welcomed the decision.

" I supported the appeal. ... I think it is a more appropriate
sentence," Shinkaruk said, noting the court faces a difficult task
when imposing sentence in such a complex case.

" I'm glad the courts are looking at it again, and I look to them to
make any decisions," Shinkaruk said, referring to another pending
appeal by the Crown of the sentence of Punko's co-accused, Randy Potts.

On March 12, Leask handed the two members of the Hells Angels short
sentences for trafficking large amounts of meth and cocaine.

Punko, 43, was sentenced to 14 months for conspiracy to produce and
deal 50 kilograms of methamphetamine as well as trafficking five
kilograms of cocaine, while Potts was given one year for his role.

The Crown had asked for 16 and 12 years, respectively.

Punko and Potts pleaded guilty last Dec. 7 to trafficking cocaine,
possessing more than $ 387,000 in cash that was the proceeds of crime,
and conspiring to produce meth in a drug lab. Leask found a number of
mitigating factors to reduce the bikers' sentences, including an early
plea, rehabilitation, and the fact that police used an agent, Michael
Plante, who fed Punko's addiction to prescription painkillers and got
him involved in meth production.

At the time, Leask said the bikers were " pawns of police" because
they were low-level targets used to get to higher-level targets in the
Vancouver East End chapter of the Hells Angels.

But the appeal judges found that Leask did not balance those
mitigating factors with the gravity of Punko's crimes. " In my
opinion, the piecemeal approach used by the sentencing judge was an
error in principle that caused him to give undue weight to the
mitigating factors of the guilty plea and the police conduct," Justice
David Tysoe said in the appeal court's decision.

Appeal Court Justice Kenneth Smith called Punko's transgressions "
serious criminal offences" and found Leask had imposed an unfit
sentence for the severity of the crime and its effect on the community.

" In his consideration of the gravity of Mr. Punko's methamphetamine
offence, the judge overlooked the significant fact that a very large
amount of methamphetamine produced by Mr. Punko and his partners was
distributed into the illegal market - all but 8 kilograms of the
approximately 50 kilograms they produced during the period covered by
the indictment," Smith wrote.

" This very large amount of methamphetamine undoubtedly caused
substantial harm directly to those unfortunate addicts who consumed it
and indirectly to society in general."

Smith said the sentence did not recognize and condemn that harm and
suggested the sentence be increased to 26 months.

While two other appeal judges agreed with Smith that the sentence was
unfit, they said the sentence should be much longer: eight years in
prison with a credit of 34 months for time in custody, which means
Punko has five years and two months left to serve.

During sentencing, Leask said he would have given Punko six years if
the case had gone to trial, but deducted one year for the guilty plea,
another for police involvement in creating the crimes and the 34
months credit for time served.

In filing the appeal, Crown counsel argued Punko was a financier and a
controlling mind of the meth conspiracy, already had a serious
criminal record and was motivated by greed.

The bikers were charged in 2005 after a two-year, $ 10-million dollar
police investigation code-named Project E-Pandora. Six Hells Angels
and 13 associates were charged.