A North Vancouver man who stole cigarettes from London Drugs during the Stanley Cup riot two years ago has received a suspended sentence and been put on probation for 16 months.
Judge Reginald Harris handed the sentence to Todd Gartland, 23, June 19 after Gartland pleaded guilty earlier to participating in a riot. The sentence means Gartland will have a criminal record, but will not have to spend any time in jail or under house arrest.
Gartland was among the crowd of looters who surged into the downtown London Drugs store at Granville and Georgia on the night of the riot after some people smashed the front windows of the store. Gartland was captured on security cameras walking into the store wearing a Canucks hockey jersey, then leaving moments later with two cartons of cigarettes, which he almost immediately discarded.
I was a drunk idiot. I went into London Drugs, he later told police. I didnt destroy the city.
Gartland turned himself in six months after the riot, when the Vancouver police department posted a photo of him online as a suspected rioter.
In an earlier sentencing hearing, Gartlands lawyer described his clients actions as relatively minor, amounting to a split second of bad judgment while drunk in an otherwise exemplary life.
Most of the rioters who have been sentenced have received conditional sentences, to be served at home, of between three to five months.
