A Toronto man who was on the run and stole a boat called The Getaway has found out the hard way that names are not always to be taken literally.
Last September, Mohammad Yazed Saleh, 31, drove from Alberta to the Lennox Passage Yacht Club in the small coastal community of D’Escousse, N.S., where he took a Cape Islander fishing boat and was caught a week later, drifting on the Atlantic Ocean east of Sable Island and headed for dangerous waters.
Saleh, who admitted to theft of the vessel and to possession of a truck reported stolen in Alberta, told court officials he was trying to evade organized crime and was headed for Morocco, where he hoped to claim asylum.
Crown prosecutor Keavin Gallant Finnerty said there are few, if any, precedents in Canadian law.
“It’s not every day where you have a case where someone is found 300 kilometres or so offshore out in the ocean,” he said outside Port Hawkesbury provincial court on Monday, where Saleh was sentenced.
“He received … just over eight months in jail to hold him accountable for what clearly is a very serious offence.”
In court, Saleh said a man in Edmonton had befriended him and helped him with his car restoration business and after that he began to fear for his life.
Gallant Finnerty said RCMP investigated Saleh’s claims about organized crime, but found no evidence of that.
He said Saleh’s sentence is eight months, but with credit for being in custody since his arrest last September, he is being released this week on time served.
The sentence was jointly recommended by the Crown and defence.
Judge Laurie Halfpenny-MacQuarrie said it was difficult to accept an eight-month sentence, especially with Saleh’s prior conviction in Ontario for robbery nearly 10 years ago.
But she said in Saleh’s state of mind at the time, he feared for his life and was “a desperate man” who “did a desperate thing.”
Saleh’s legal aid lawyer, Adam Rodgers, said the sentence was reasonable, because his client has spent just over five straight months in jail.
He said Saleh randomly chose the marina in D’Escousse because it was on the East Coast and likely had a boat he could take.
“He probably could have chosen Canso or maybe Louisbourg or somewhere else, but that was the decision-making factor.”
Rodgers said Saleh was no sailor and he underestimated the challenges of the open Atlantic Ocean in September.
“He would have been facing some extremely rough seas. That time of year, it’s hurricane season off the Atlantic,” Rodgers said.
“It would have been a very dangerous thing to continue … and I’m not sure he even had enough fuel to get there, so he probably would have been stranded at some point in the middle of the ocean.”
Court was told surveillance video at the yacht club showed Saleh arriving in the truck and taking The Getaway.
Gallant Finnerty said Saleh told RCMP he chose that boat because of the name.
He was caught a week later in what the judge said was likely a “quite costly” joint operation by the coast guard, the RCMP and the military.
“I think he probably did well for a non-sailor to make it as far as Sable Island,” Rodgers said.
“He was rescued by the coast guard, for which he was grateful, but by his own account, he was running low on resources and he thought maybe another couple of days and he would have been in serious trouble.”
Rodgers said Saleh no longer fears for his life and is no longer seeking asylum outside the country.
Saleh told the court he was sorry for his actions and was thankful for the rescue after running low on supplies and becoming seasick.
“I’m trying to take responsibility for what I did,” he said.
Saleh said after his release, he hopes to stay in Nova Scotia and reunite with his wife and three children.
“I just want to start all over again. From what I know right now, you guys are nice people. I think I’ll stay here.”
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