Local RCMP and NPD honoured for seizing most contraband of any BC police force
By Contributor
More than $5 million cash, more than 200 illegal weapons, and thousands of pounds of illegal drugs are off Kootenay streets – and local police were recognized in June for making that happen.
RCMP officers and officers from the Nelson Police Department assigned to the RCMP Southeast District Traffic Services and the Integrated Road Safety Units were formally recognized by the Solicitor General’s Department of Civil Forfeiture at the recent June meeting of the BC Chiefs of Police Association, held in Penticton.
RCMP Supt. Randy Kolibaba received the award on behalf of his officers, in recognition of their tireless work in disrupting criminal activity and the wider distribution of contraband in the province of BC.
In presenting the first-ever award of its kind, Rob Kroeker, the director of BC Civil Forfeiture, highlighted that over the past six years, from 2006 to 2011, investigators with the RCMP SE District Traffic Services – IRSU units have seized over $75 million in cash, drugs and property as a result of traffic investigations being initiated on BC highways within the Southeast District of the province.
In 2011 alone, the 132 officers, including three officers seconded from the Nelson PD, seized more contraband than any other policing agency within the Province of BC, municipal or provincial units combined. These seizures included drugs, cash, illegal weapons and property that was either seized as evidence and forfeited as being used in the commission of an offence, or as a result of their findings, later seized by the Civil Forfeiture Department under the Civil Forfeiture Act.
Highlights totals of seizures between 2006 and 2011:
•Cash: $ 5,100,985.85;
•Marijuana (packaged):3, 677.42 lbs or 1.67 tons, 402.00 lbs (shake);
•Total 4, 079.42 lbs or 2.04 tons;
•Marijuana plants: 48, 530 plants;
•Cocaine: 49 kilos;
•Methamphetamine: 1.236 kilos / $1.5 million of methamphetamine pre-cursor chemicals;
•Ecstacy: 402,962 tablets;
•GHB: 2.55 litres;
•Weapons: 219 illegal weapons (knives, brass knuckles, etc.);
•45 hand guns;
•39 long rifles;
•1 Uzi sub-machine gun.
Property:
•Four houses;
•Twelve vehicles;
•Three motorcycles;
•One trailer.
“Our traffic service investigators are extremely vigilant in uncovering any type criminal activity while carrying out their road safety duties. Our main goal is to make B.C.’s highways the safest in the world,” added Kolibaba.
