Bakery robber jailed
Brodie Daniel Holmes gets 21-month sentence after robbing bakery at knifepoint to get money to buy drugs
A man who went straight to his drug dealer with the money he got from robbing a bakery at knifepoint was sentenced recently to serve 21 months in jail.
Brodie Daniel Holmes, 23, appeared before Judge John Douglas in provincial court in Charlottetown for sentencing after previously pleading guilty to five charges, including armed robbery.
Holmes didn’t have a criminal record when he started committing crimes in February to feed his addiction to opiates.
The court heard that changed after Holmes’s drug use escalated from the marijuana he started smoking in high school to harder drugs like speed and opiates.
A pre-sentence report said Holmes started injecting opiates and within a month he was unable to afford it so he turned to crime.
In February, the police found Holmes with items taken from vehicles in the Cineplex Cinemas parking lot in Charlottetown after the owner of a stolen phone used an app to track it.
After his arrest, he was scheduled to appear in court March 13.
Before that happened, Holmes went to Nick’s Bakery, Deli and Convenience in Charlottetown wearing a hoodie, a bandana and sunglasses.
Holmes had a knife in his hand and demanded money from the clerk.
She gave him $410 and he fled.
Holmes told the police he went straight to his drug dealer and used the stolen money to buy drugs.
He was held in custody after his arrest for the robbery.
Defence lawyer Thane MacEachern said Holmes was trying to get into an in-patient withdrawal program, but he didn’t get help before committing the offence.
Before hearing his sentence, Holmes rose to say he was remorseful.
“I’d really like to apologize to everyone involved,” he said.
Douglas said when he started as a judge, robberies weren’t very common.
“Now it’s either a weekly or a monthly event,” he said.
When determining an appropriate sentence, Douglas said the public has to have confidence the courts are taking those matters seriously.
On the robbery charge, Douglas gave Holmes a two-year sentence, minus three months of credit for time served.
Douglas said the message was that if people commit robberies in Charlottetown they will likely get time in a federal prison unless there are serious mitigating factors.
He also gave Holmes a suspended sentence for possessing a stolen iPhone, 15 days for possessing stolen tobacco vaping equipment, 30 days for possessing a stolen iPod and 30 days for possessing a different stolen phone, all to be served concurrently.
Holmes will be on probation for two years after his release, he must provide a DNA sample for the national databank and will be under a weapons prohibition for 10 years.