A6 TUESDAY, MAY 28, 2013 CHILLIWACK TIMES
News
Not a bad guy, just makes ‘bad decisions’ BY TYLER OLSEN tolsen@chilliwacktimes.com
Distinctive tattoo led cops to robber’s door
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A large man, Turnbull had already been designated as a prolific offender by Chilliwack RCMP. He entered the credit union wearing a hooded parka, but complied when asked to remove the hood, the court heard. When he reached the teller, he passed a note that read: “I want $15,000 in 50s and 100s. Do not put a dye pack in or hell to pay. Think of your customers . . . someone is outside with a scanner. Do your job, no [one] will get hurt.” Turnbull left with just $400. After quickly identifying their suspect, police immediately headed to
he skull tattoo was a dead giveaway. Called to Prospera Credit Union on Nov. 18 after a report of a robbery, investigators found themselves looking at video of the distinctively tattooed head of James Turnbull. Eighteen months later, Turnbull was in Provincial Court as Crown counsel Brian Fell asked a judge to send the repeat offender to prison for between five and seven years. The robbery was “doomed to fail” from the outset, according to Turnbull’s lawyer Suzanne Paterson, who asked for house arrest.
the house of Turnbull’s sometimesgirlfriend. She arrived on the scene to find the Mounties had not yet approached her home.The girlfriend invited the officers inside, saying Turnbull should not be there. When Mounties entered, they immediately spotted Turnbull, who was arrested without incident. In asking for a stiff sentence, Fell cited a pre-sentence report compiled by Turnbull’s probation officer. He said the report “shows someone who is entrenched into criminality at an early age and has never
taken any steps to rehabilitate himself.” Turnbull has a long criminal record, and has previously spent time in jail for mischief in connection to a 2009 fire, and to offences in 2006 and 2002. But Paterson took issue with the report and its insistence that Turnbull hadn’t been trying to turn his life around. She called Turnbull to the witness stand, from which he told the court that he had been clean of drugs for 17 months since weaning himself off methadone.
He said he had gotten clean in a recovery house and had already been admitted to a Chilliwack River Valley treatment centre. “Forty-three-years-old, I’m burnt out man,” he said. “I’m just done with it. “Now it’s time for me to get up, man up and go back to being normal.” He said he had burnt his bridges and distanced himself from friends connected to the drug world. “I’m not a bad guy,” he said. “I’ve made bad decisions.” The sentencing hearing will continue at a later date, with Fell given the opportunity to cross-examine Turnbull’s testimony.
Pipeline project inching forward BY PAUL J. HENDERSON phenderson@chilliwacktimes.com
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he twinning of the Trans Mountain oil pipeline through Chilliwack took another step forward on Thursday as owner Kinder Morgan filed a project description with the National Energy Board (NEB). The filing comes on the heels of the NEB’s approval of how Trans Mountain will charge customers to send oil through the expanded pipeline. Kinder Morgan’s $5.4-billion proposal would nearly triple the capacity of the 60-year-old pipeline from 300,000 barrels per day (bpd) to 890,000 bpd. This would involve 981 kilometres of new buried pipeline, new pump stations and tanks, along with new tanker loading facilities at Burnaby’s Westridge Marine Terminal, according to the project description. The company has remained silent on the routing for the new pipe, saying only that it would follow the existing rightof-way wherever possible. In a May 23 letter accompanying the application to the NEB, Kinder Morgan Canada president Ian Anderson said the company has begun its consultation with aboriginal peoples, landowners, municipalities and other stakeholders. “Trans Mountain is working with these groups to better define the issues and concerns and address them through development of our facilities application and the project,” Anderson wrote. The filing with the NEB is part of the pre-application process, which initiates certain activities including preliminary aboriginal engagement and other public consultation. According to the NEB, the project description filing
allows for those affected to contact the proponent for more information and for those who want to participate in the hearing process to organize “to present an effective and efficient single voice on one or more issues at a hearing.” Groups can also inquire if they qualify for the NEB participant funding, which is available for those with direct, local interest in the pipeline expansion and those who “would play an important and distinct role in the process.” Local opposition to the proposal has come from antipipeline group PIPE UP. The group points to oil spills from pipelines over the years as a reason to oppose the project. The closest to home was the 110,000-litre oil leak on Jan. 24, 2012 at the company’s Sumas Mountain terminal site. In 2007, a contractor in Burnaby ruptured the pipeline spraying 234,000 litres of crude oil into the residential neighbourhood. BurnabyDouglas NDP MP Kennedy Stewart has come out against the project, calling it a bad deal for B.C. “We don’t really in B.C. see any benefits from that,” Stewart said, suggesting the bulk of any taxes on the revenue are federal. “This new pipeline is for export only. There’s no local revenue share. By all accounts, there will be no local jobs and there will be no local use of the product. “On the other side, we’ll be taking the risks.” Another local issue came up when the Fraser Valley Regional District (FVRD) approved the company’s request to conduct a corridor study through the Cheam Lake Wetlands Regional Park. Trans Mountain expects to file its expansion application in late 2013. If approved, the project would be operational by 2017.
Expires June 15/13
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