Alleged gang member handed seven years for handgun offence

Alleged FOB gang member Yee Hung (Roland) Chin is not a lost cause, despite being handed a seven-year prison sentence for possessing a loaded handgun found in his vehicle 18 months ago, a judge said on Friday.

“You’re only 29, I do not consider you to be a lifetime criminal,” provincial court Judge Sharon Van de Veen told Chin. “Decide for yourself, at 29 years, to look at the rest of your life.”

“I’ll take something positive from this sentence,” Chin replied before being escorted to a holding cell by a sheriff.

Van de Veen, noting the offender had been out of prison for only a year after serving five years for similar weapons and drug offences, gave him six years for possessing the .40-calibre handgun found under the hood of a Cadillac Escalade he was driving in June 2011.

She also gave him one year consecutive for breaching a court order to not possess any weapons stemming from the prior conviction.

He got another year each, to run concurrently, for three other weapons convictions related to the same incident.

Crown prosecutor Shane Parker had argued for a total sentence of eight years. Defence lawyer Michael Bates, who had his bid for a mistrial earlier dismissed, had sought six years. Both included a year for the breach of court order.

The minimum time for possessing a loaded firearm is five years.

“A further aggravating factor in this case is that the firearm was found in the engine cavity of his vehicle in a condition which was ready for lethal use at the time the police seized his vehicle,” said Van de Veen.

“The firearm was a handgun with a bullet in the chamber, ready for use, and a magazine with five additional rounds. The serial number on the gun had been removed and it was wrapped in a latex glove, butt end up in a cardboard box, in a condition which allowed it to be easily retrieved for immediate use.”

The judge noted Chin was stopped by police as he drove in public with the firearm in this condition in the engine cavity of his vehicle.

The fact the firearm was in the engine cavity of the vehicle in that condition, she added, is such that “the potential for its use in a public setting is obvious.”

Chin must provide a DNA samples and was prohibited from owning or possessing any firearms, ammunition or other weapons for life.