By Ashley Legassic

Kamloops drug mule sentenced to four years in prison

Mar 27, 2019 | 4:17 PM

KAMLOOPS — It appears another dent has been made in the Kamloops drug trade.

Chad Bissat was sentenced to four years in prison earlier this month for 19 drug- and firearms-related charges.

Bissat was arrested on March 24, 2016. He was riding a bicycle and carrying a backpack filled with more than 120 grams of cocaine, 196 grams of methamphetamine, and 60 fentanyl pills. 

B.C. Supreme Court Justice Warren Milman writes in a decision that one of several aggravating factors in this case was the amount of drugs involved.

“Although the relevant events took place relatively early in the life of the fentanyl crisis, I agree with Crown counsel that it is a significantly aggravating factor that the trafficking here involved fentanyl. Crown counsel points to the scope of the crisis already underway and growing at the time that this offence was committed, acknowledging, however, that it was not then what it has since become.”

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Police discovered the drugs after they stopped Bissat, and executed another search warrant at his home later that evening. There, they found 1.5 kilograms of cocaine, more than 540 fentanyl pills, nearly 60 grams of a heroin and fentanyl mixture, four grams of heroin, 605 grams of meth, eight kilograms of GHB, 71 grams of MDMA, eight pounds of cannabis, among plenty of other drugs.

“Although the relevant events took place relatively early in the life of the fentanyl crisis, I agree with Crown counsel that it is a significantly aggravating factor that the trafficking here involved fentanyl. Crown counsel points to the scope of the crisis already underway and growing at the time that this offence was committed, acknowledging, however, that it was not then what it has since become.

During trial, Crown said that in total the drugs had a bulk value of approximately $120,000, and a retail value of about $200,000. In addition, police found cash, cutting agents, scoresheets, a measuring cup and scales.

Milman wrote in his decision that evidence during trial suggests Bissat was a mid- to high-level drug distributor. Bissat said he was acting as a mover, which means he was entrusted with large quantities of drugs in his house, and he was in charge of moving them from place to place for them to be sold.

“He says he was paid both in cash and drugs, but mostly in drugs,” Milman wrote.

Bissat, now 30, was given a four-year sentence for the 19 counts he was convicted of, and he’s been given a 10-year firearm prohibition.

But Milman also detailed Bissat’s early life in his decision.

“Mr. Bissat’s life began to go off course at age 14 when he lost his father as a result of a heart attack,” he writes. “He suffered from depression and anxiety and began to self-medicate using alcohol, which eventually escalated to ecstasy and cocaine.” 

“His drug use began interfering with his ability to keep a job… By the time of the offences that bring him to court today, he had been out of work for a period of six months to a year. He became a heavy drug user. He became addicted to cocaine and would then come down by taking Oxycodone. He tried heroin. This pattern of heavy drug use drained his savings. He says he took to trafficking to feed his addiction.”

In determining Bissat’s sentence, Milman focused on denunciation and deterrence for these kinds of offences.

“Many of the features of this case point to a sentence at the higher end of the range, particularly the quantities and varieties of the drugs and the relatively high level of responsibility that Mr. Bissat appears to have had in this trafficking operation,” Milman said. “Another important aggravating factor here is the fact that Mr. Bissat kept a loaded firearm for his protection.”