B.C. gangster one of 15 people charged with attempted murder in Halifax-area jail attack
Credit to Author: Gordon McIntyre| Date: Fri, 20 Dec 2019 00:43:29 +0000
Sophon Sek, who spent almost four years in prison for his role in the Surrey Six murders, has been charged with attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder after an attack in a Dartmouth, N.S., jail.
The 40-year-old was one of 15 charged after a 46-year-old male prisoner was viciously assaulted on Dec. 2. The victim suffered life-threatening injuries, according to Dartmouth police, and was taken to a hospital. The 15 also were charged with forcible confinement, aggravated assault, assault with a weapon and resisting/obstructing a peace officer.
Sek had been granted statutory release from his Surrey Six sentence on Sept. 27 after serving two-thirds of an almost six-year sentence for trafficking, firearms offences, and break and enter.
The break and enter was for assistance he gave to Red Scorpion gang killers that allowed them to enter Surrey’s Balmoral Tower on Oct. 19, 2007, where they murdered six people.
Two of the victims were uninvolved bystanders.
Sek had originally been charged with manslaughter, but pleaded guilty to the lesser count and received another year to his sentence for unrelated gun and drug offences.
Upon his release from a prison in Atlantic Canada, he was immediately jailed because a deportation order had been issued against him while he was serving his sentence.
At a deportation hearing carried out by phone, which Postmedia listened in on, Sek said he had not retained a lawyer and had no evidence to present.
A Canada Border Services Agency officer told a member of the immigration board that the federal government had issued a “danger opinion” for Sek, which meant the public would be at risk if he stayed in Canada.
“The minister is recommending that the preventative detention of Mr. Sek continue until his removal,” the CBSA agent said. “The minister submits the reason for the danger opinion was clear and very concerning — his involvement in the drug trafficking as well as possession of weapons.”
Sek decided not to fight the order and agreed to return to his native Cambodia, a country he hadn’t visited since arriving in Canada with his family as a child in 1986.
He was being held while the Canadian government tried to arrange for travel documents for Cambodia.
In an earlier parole hearing it emerged Sek had ended up in foster care as a teenager.
“You dropped out of school in Grade 9, indicating you were being discriminated against due to your ethnicity, and you ran away from the foster care home,” the ruling stated. “You found acceptance living on the street with a negative peer group, engaging in illicit activities to sustain your lifestyle.
“You claim to have engaged in drug trafficking to support your own family as you had little employment history.”
Sek will appear in Dartmouth provincial court to face the latest charges at a later date.
With a file from Kim Bolan