Jail term for drug trafficker after plea for ‘mercy’

A former drug addict who said getting arrested for drug possession saved his life, as he is now clean and sober, couldn’t escape a lengthy jail term.

Allan Duncan, 55, appeared in Superior Court of Justice in St. Catharines on Thursday and was sentenced to three years behind bars after being convicted of several drug-trafficking offences involving crack cocaine and heroin.

Since his arrest in 2014, court was told, Duncan has successfully completed a rehab program and regularly attends substance abuse support groups.

“I ask the court for mercy,” he told Judge Robert Reid before the sentence was imposed.

The Crown had requested a jail term in the three- to five-year range while defence counsel Brandon Chase argued a lesser sentence was more a more appropriate disposition considering the steps his client had taken to “pull himself from rock bottom.”

The judge credited Duncan with his rehabilitative efforts but said the courts must impose significant sentences due to the serious of the charges as well as to deter like-minded individuals from following in his footsteps.

“Crack cocaine is highly addictive and heroin is said to be one of the most destructive drugs,” the judge said.

Court was told the defendant sold drugs to fuel his own addictions.

“This is not a case where he was solely in it for profit,” Chase said. “He was in it to pay for his addictions.”

Duncan was arrested in February 2014 after Niagara Regional Police stopped a vehicle in St. Catharines and discovered more than 15 grams of heroin and 31 grams of crack cocaine.