What Reggie Was Facing

The discovery of approximately 20 ounces of cocaine made this a very different situation from many of Reggie’s earlier encounters with the law. He was facing a serious trafficking charge, and he was no longer coming before the courts without a record.

Among the convictions already behind him was his 1991 Halifax conviction for trafficking in a narcotic. Reggie would have understood that his previous record could now matter when he was eventually sentenced.

There was another important dividing line in the Canadian correctional system. A sentence of less than two years would normally be served in a provincial correctional institution. A sentence of two years or more would ordinarily mean a federal penitentiary. Laws and Statutes of Canada

For Reggie, that distinction would have been particularly significant. A sentence of two years less a day could keep him in the provincial system, on Prince Edward Island. Crossing the two-year threshold could mean leaving the Island and entering the federal correctional system.

We cannot know exactly what was going through Reggie’s mind while he waited for the case to work its way through the courts. But he knew his own history, and he knew he was facing a much more serious situation. He was not a physically aggressive person or someone who was comfortable fighting. From what our family knew of him, the prospect of serving time in a federal penitentiary would have frightened him.

The difference of a single day in a sentence could therefore represent something much larger: provincial jail on Prince Edward Island, or the possibility of being sent away to a federal penitentiary.