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A dial-a-dope drug dealer who threatened and beat a man he hired as a driver for his illegal business will serve another 11 months in jail for his crimes, a provincial court judge has ruled.
Arash Kardan, 24, of North Vancouver, was handed the sentence Wednesday (Oct. 12) after pleading guilty to six charges – including threats, forcible confinement and assault with a weapon – before Judge Robert Hamilton in North Vancouver provincial court.
Crown counsel Jason Krupa told the judge that before the victim in the case started working for Kardan, the man had immigrated from Iran, where he had been previously imprisoned by the Iranian government. The man is a recovering addict, who started using drugs to deal with post-traumatic stress brought on by his time in the Iranian prison, said Krupa.
In the summer of 2020, the man started working for Kardan as a driver who delivered drugs for Kardan’s dial-a-dope operation in North Vancouver, the prosecutor said.
Kardan paid the man in cash and drugs.
But late in 2020, the man decided he didn’t want to continue, and told Kardan.
According to an agreed statement of facts, following that, on Sept. 30, 2020, Kardan and another man approached the victim one day and accused him of stealing $10,000 of crack cocaine from them. Kardan told the man he would have to pay back the money or work off the debt, said Krupa. When the victim denied stealing the drugs, Kardan and the other man grabbed the former driver and forced him into the back seat of a waiting car. They then drove to a yard near Mount Seymour Parkway and Lillooet Road, where they struck the victim in the head multiple times. The second man then took a fake handgun from behind his back and pointed it at the victim’s head, threatening to kill him if he didn’t repay the debt, said the prosecutor.
A few days later, Kardan sent repeated text messages to the victim, said Krupa, demanding to know why he wasn’t responding. On Oct. 5, 2020, Kardan and a second man drove to the victim’s home, grabbed him by the neck and forced him into the back seat of a vehicle again. Kardan held a metal object and said if the victim didn’t show up for work, he would beat him, said Krupa.
The men took the victim to a field on Third Street East, threw him to the ground and punched him in the face. They later dropped him bleeding in an alley near his home.
The actions were aggravated both because of the violence involved and degree of premeditation, said Krupa. But Kardan is also relatively young and has no criminal record, he said.
Acting on a joint submission from the prosecutor and Kardan’s defence lawyer, Judge Robert Hamilton sentenced Kardan to two years in jail on two counts of forcible confinement. Kardan’s time in jail, however, was reduced by over a year for time already spent in custody.
Kardan was also sentenced to jail time for two charges of assault with a weapon and two charges of threatening. All those sentences will be served concurrently.
Five additional gun charges, including possession of a prohibited weapon and possession of ammunition without a licence, were dropped by the Crown.
But on the request of the prosecutor, the judge ordered the forfeiture of weapons and ammunition seized by police during the investigation, including a brown and black nine-millimetre handgun, a broken black magazine, 11 live nine-millimetre rounds of ammunition and a spring from a firearm magazine.
Kardan is currently awaiting sentencing on several other drug charges connected to the dial-a-dope operation itself, including possession of fentanyl, heroin and cocaine for the purpose of trafficking. Crown is seeking a three-year jail term on those while Kardan’s defence lawyer has asked for 12 months. The judge is expected to give his decision on the sentence next month.
