AILING COCAINE DEALER WON'T DIE IN JAIL: COURT

A convicted cocaine dealer, who is dying of cancer, will not live out his
final days in prison. Last July, Joseph Lynden Andrews, 64, was handed a
four-year sentence for possession of cocaine for the purpose of trafficking.

Yesterday, the Manitoba Court of Appeal overturned the sentence and
substituted a conditional sentence of two years less a day followed by two
years of supervised probation.

"If his sentence is maintained, he may well die in the medical ward of a
federal penitentiary," he court stated in its written decision.

The court also noted the original sentence by Justice Kenneth Hanssen "was
not unfit at the time of imposition." Andrews also suffers from diabetes,
kidney disease, eye disease and pancreatic disease, the court noted.

Andrews spent 17 1/2 months in custody following his February 2002 arrest
by Winnipeg police.

Police found two kilos of cocaine, with an estimated street value of
$300,000, in a cooler that Andrews, a resident of Langley, B.C., had
obtained in Mexico.