FILE PHOTO

Image Credit: Cliff MacArthur/provincialcourt.bc.ca

A man whose crime spree stretched from Regina to Oliver is spending four more months behind bars after receiving his sentence Monday in provincial court in Penticton.

Parker James Ardiel, 31, pleaded guilty to a long list of charges from Oliver and Saskatchewan Monday, Dec. 14, including being unlawfully in a house, possessing a firearm without a license, possessing stolen property, possessing a controlled substance (meth), obstructing a police officer, breaching multiple court conditions, mischief and failure to appear in court.

Police responded to reports of a stolen Chevy Cobalt in the Oliver area on April 13, 2019 and found Ardiel passed out in the vehicle parked in a vineyard off Black Sage Road. Ardiel also pleaded guilty to breaching a court-ordered driving condition when he was caught by police in the Oliver area driving a three-wheel ATV and gave a false name to police in in September, 2018.

In April, 2019, Ardiel had called a friend to drive him from Penticton to Oliver. The woman and another friend were en route with Ardiel to Oliver when, as Crown counsel put it, a "misunderstanding or confusion about somebody taking money out of the friend's wallet," occurred.

"A argument ensued and as a result of that argument the accused took a baseball bat and damaged the friend's car with the baseball bat," Crown counsel John Swanson said. "He then got into the vehicle and was in the process of starting to drive it away, he was stopped however, and of course at that time, again, he was on an undertaking not to occupy the driver's seat of a motor vehicle."

Ardiel also pleaded guilty to a breach of court-ordered conditions after removing an electronic monitoring device while on house arrest in June, 2019.

Charges were brought in from Saskatchewan Monday which Ardiel pleaded guilty to, including being in possession of a Winchester rifle without a license, and being in possession of stolen property following the execution of a search warrant in Regina. According to the Crown, Ardiel gave a full confession to police after the search warrant turned up stolen electronics, ammunition and clothing.

Ardiel pleaded guilty to more charges out of Saskatchewan following an incident where police were called by the mother of Ardiel's child after he broke into her home on Rosemont Crescent in Regina. Ardiel pleaded guilty to mischief and being unlawfully in a dwelling. Crown said Ardiel broke through a front window with a rock. Ardiel later told the court he shared a child with the ex-partner and the relationship has been since "patched up."

Prior to moving to Saskatchewan, Ardiel was residing in the Oliver area. He was previously employed in the oil industry in a supervisory position, however, drug use led him astray according to defence counsel James Pennington.

"Unfortunately, and this is often the case working in the patch, you work hard, you live hard — and Mr. Ardiel met heroin," Pennington said. "And, as is so often the case, life just went right down the drain at that point."

"I'm sorry for obviously the time it takes to deal with all this," Ardiel said while addressing the court during his sentencing hearing Monday. "I made a bunch of mistakes and it cost me a lot of time, and other people it cost them even more. I would like to put this all in the past and go back to work."

"And obviously to the people that have been affected by my crimes, I am sorry, and those choices were poor."

Ardiel spent a total of 310 days in pre-trial custody, which equates to 465 days served with pre-trial custody credit.

Crown recommended a 25-month sentence for all the charges, which after Ardiel's pre-trial custody credit would have amounted to roughly 10 more months new jail time.

Judge Andrew Tam instead opted for defence counsel's submission of four months of new jail time.

— This story was originally publish by the Times-Chronicle.

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