He went to jail for a couple days while his lawyer filed the paperwork for an appeal.
Then, on Sept. 28, he went missing from the area of Royal Columbian Hospital in New Westminster.
Police at the time said friends and family were “very concerned” about his safety and urged everyone to help look for him.
He was found dead the same day.
Police said no foul play was suspected. No cause of death has been made public.
It was a strange end to a case that had been making its way through the courts since Chan and his co-accused, Lawton Louis Ma, were arrested on Feb. 3, 2017, according to court documents.
The two men had fought the charges, making numerous applications for evidence to be thrown out because Vancouver police had allegedly breached their Charter rights.
Justice Alan Ross eventually concluded there had been six Charter breaches in all, but he dismissed a stay of proceedings.
By that time, Ma had died, and Chan was the only one left to convict.
Crown prosecutor Daniel Meneley called for a nine-year prison term, while Chan’s lawyer, Scott Wright argued his client should get a conditional discharge or a two-year jail sentence followed by three years’ probation.
Wright pointed to the fact Chan, a husband and father of a young child with autism, had had no prior criminal record and had already turned his life around, separating himself from the drug subculture as soon as he was arrested.
Weighing the evidence, Ross concluded Chan had been a mid-level drug trafficker, primarily in fentanyl (police seized about a kilogram of the deadly drug from the operation’s stash house), and sentenced him to four years in prison, according to court documents.
“Mr. Chan set out to profit from the misery of the most vulnerable members of our society,” Ross said in his sentencing ruling. “I have considered Mr. Chan's submissions, but the court must accord appropriate weight to the principles of denunciation and deterrence.”
Both the Crown and the defence appealed the sentence.
Wright also appealed the conviction itself.
But now there’s no one left to appeal it for.
This month, the B.C. Court of Appeal ruled to dismiss the case due to the death of the remaining accused.
“It was very unusual,” Wright said in an interview with the NOW.
“It was really sad,” he said. “He was still in his 40s and had a young child and a wife, and they were very supportive of him.”
Follow Cornelia Naylor on Twitter @CorNaylor
