Two years in jail for break-in

Aaron Christopher Kent Prichard sentenced for his part in case that resulted in man being killed by police

A Summerside man is going to jail for his part in a series of events that started with the sale of fake drugs and ended with his friend being shot by police during an arrest.

Aaron Christopher Kent Prichard, 35, was sentenced to two years in jail and received credit for the equivalent of seven and a half months he’s spent in custody since his arrest. He must also serve 24 months of probation, submit a DNA sample to the national criminal database and is prohibited from owning weapons for 10 years.

He pleaded guilty to one count of breaking and entering with intent to commit and indictable offence.

When summing up the case, Provincial Court Judge Jeff Lantz, said it was another example of how dangerous drug culture is and how it can so often have tragic consequences.

“It’s been said for some time now that it is only a matter of time until someone is killed. In this case, indirectly, not as one would expect, someone did lose their life,” said Lantz.

Prichard was one of three men charged in relation to a violent hotel room invasion in the city earlier this year. Another, Scott Bruce Dalziel, 40, was sentenced in August to 12 months in jail. The third, Congjie Tan, 26, is still before the courts. A fourth suspect, Jeremy Stephens, 32, of Summerside, was shot by police as they attempted to arrest him. He later died in hospital. Nova Scotia’s Serious Incident Response Team is investigating the death.

According to the agreed statement of facts between the Crown and the Prichard’s defence, the robbery took place in the early morning hours of May 27.

Prichard and three other men went to a room at the Quality Inn hotel in Summeride. There was another man and a woman already in the room.

Prichard later told police that he’d bought 100 speed pills for $200 that night but they had turned out to be vitamins. He, Dalziel, Stephens and, allegedly, Tan went to the room to try and resolve the situation. One of them had a key and they let themselves in.

The discussion quickly degenerated into a fight and the man and woman occupying the room were cut with a small knife and struck with a pipe, respectively.

The group of men left the room and drove to O’Leary, stopping for gas. They also threw the pipe and knife out of the car along the way.

Meanwhile, the woman who had been assaulted called 911 and Summerside Police Services responded to the hotel.

The men in the car returned to Summerside, dropped Dalziel off at his home and then went to Prichard’s parents’ home where they spent the rest of the night.

Police went to the home the next morning to arrest Tan and Stephens, at that point they were unaware of Prichard’s involvement. Police allege Stephens violently resisted arrest leading officers to resort to shooting him. Tan was arrested without incident. Dalziel turned himself in to police a couple of days later and Prichard was arrested shortly after that.

In his sentencing, Judge Lantz said he was taking into account Prichard’s lack of a significant criminal record, his early guilty plea and that he was one of the only witnesses in this case who cooperated with the police investigation.