A Vancouver man has been fined $5,000 and banned from possessing firearms for two years after pleading guilty to unsafe hunting charges in Pemberton
On Wednesday, Anson Kwok Ming Chan pleaded guilty in North Vancouver Provincial Court to one count of dangerous hunting or trapping under the Wildlife Act and one count of discharging a firearm in a no-shooting area.
The charges stem from a Sept. 2022 incident on Pemberton Meadow Road. Chan, a hunter for more than 30 years, had been with a friend in the area when, about 20 minutes after sundown, he spotted a mule deer at the edge of a farmer’s field. Chan pulled over and fired two shots at the deer with his .280-calibre hunting rifle, according to an agreed statement of facts read out in court.
Neighbours heard the gunfire and came out to confront Chan, taking pictures of him and his licence plate. Rather than check to see if he’d struck the deer with any of his shots, Chan and his friend left the area and the neighbours reported the incident to the B.C. Conservation Officer Service.
The next day, after the sun had come up, the neighbours found the deer lying dead in the field.
Several days later, COs caught up with Chan and he voluntarily gave them a statement.
'Simply by luck' no one was injured, Crown says
The Crown and defence agreed that a fine of $5,000 ($3,500 for the dangerous hunting and $1,500 for shooting near a roadway) plus a two-year ban on hunting and owning firearms would be appropriate.
“Mr. Chan fired two shots with a higher-calibre rifle round into the dark without proper regard for where those bullets were going to end up. That’s certainly extremely dangerous and reckless. As a (gun licence) holder and a qualified hunter, Mr. Chan should have known better,” Crown counsel Daniel Shih told the court.
“Further aggravating in the circumstances is the fact that shots ended up in the direction of an occupied residence, which is a mere 400 meters away from the direct line of fire. The .280 rounds would have easily been able to reach that distance, and so it was simply by luck that no one was injured as a result,” he said.
Chan’s lawyer Brent Ellington said that his client has a long history of hunting without any previous infractions and that he was otherwise fully licensed to be hunting at the time of the incident.
“He does acknowledge that he made a mistake in this circumstance and he’ll have time to consider safe practices in the future,” he said.
Provincial court judge Diana Vandor acknowledged that Chan had pleaded guilty and taken full responsibility for his actions. She also noted his otherwise clean record.
The fines and hunting ban should deter Chan and others from committing similar Wildlife Act offences in the future, she said.
“Mr. Chan shot at a deer after dark in the direction of the home, and in so doing, he created a risk to those community residents and this among other facts, makes the offence serious,” Vandor said.
As a result of the sentence, any firearms Chan owns now will be seized by the government.
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