Saskatchewan: A Punjabi truck driver in Canada has been sentenced to six months after pleading guilty to possessing opium found during a border inspection earlier this year.
Iqbal Singh Kahlon was stopped for inspection at the US-Canada border in March. According to the case details, a specially trained sniffer dog alerted officers to a small bottle labelled as containing vitamin D3 capsules in his vehicle. A search reportedly led to the discovery of 250 opium pills weighing around 67 grams.
The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) referred the case to Saskatchewan police, who registered a case and brought Kahlon before the court.
During a hearing on Wednesday, Kahlon admitted the offence and told the judge he was not a drug trafficker but an opium user who had kept the substance for personal consumption. He asked the court for leniency.
The prosecutor told the court that 13 grams of opium had previously been found in Kahlon’s possession, but no case was filed at the time because the quantity was within the reported 15-gram threshold.
Taking the circumstances into account, the judge sentenced Kahlon to six months, to be served at home under specified conditions rather than in prison. He was also ordered to complete 25 hours of community service. The sentence will be subject to the court’s conditions, which Kahlon accepted.
