A Throttle Lockers emblem is seen in this photo submitted by RCMP.

Image Credit: SUBMITTED/RCMP

Five years after police raided an alleged drug supplier's business, a BC Supreme Court judge sentenced him to more than a decade behind bars.

Zale Coty, 55, was at the centre of a lengthy drug investigation that involved covert surveillance, a wiretap and undercover drug purchases, connecting him to suppliers in Vancouver and Calgary.

The police operation, dubbed "E-Petrifaction," purported to result in the disruption of Okanagan-based Hells Angels support club the Throttle Lockers. Kamloops RCMP, along the provincial gang enforcement squad, charged three men in the investigation.

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But the biker gang connection wasn't mentioned in court. Coty pleaded guilty in April and the court only heard a description of Coty's standing within the drug trade hierarchy.

Justice Sheri Ann Donegan said Coty was at the highest level in Kamloops, selling to middle and low level dealers locally. He sold fentanyl, cocaine and methamphetamine by the ounce to those dealers, but he only did so with the permission of out-of-town gangsters that supplied him. He delivered a cut of his sales to at least one of those suppliers, but it's not clear whether that went to someone in Calgary or Vancouver.

Donegan said Coty was "insulated from detection" and it was only through covert tactics police were able to pin him down.

It's not clear how long he was in the drug trade, but transcripts of his wiretap conversations include a mention that he had been "doing this" for 23 years.

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Coty has opened several successful businesses over the years in both the Kelowna and Kamloops areas, Donegan said. At the time of the search at the Valleyview garden store Sunshine Gardens in 2019, it was the only business he was running. If not for disruptions during COVID and the connection to his drug business, Donegan said it might not have closed earlier this year.

Defence lawyer Jeremy Jensen proposed a sentence of around five to six years, but the judge sided with Crown prosecutor Oren Bick who suggested a total sentence of 12 years.

Donegan noted that although he likely avoided detection for some time as Coty couldn't have reached his high local position in the drug trade overnight. She also said the four charges remain his first run-in with the criminal justice system and he hasn't yet had the "wake-up call" of a conviction.

With that, she noted Coty's sentence would likely have been much longer if it weren't his first conviction.

His two co-accused were sentenced ahead of him with Jacob Cavanagh sentenced to four years jail for his role in local drug trafficking, then Shawn Carlisle who was sentenced to 30 months in custody.

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