Police release details of city’s largest cocaine busts

P.A. Police Insp. Jonathan Bergen and RCMP Insp. Donovan Fisher take media questions Monday. The image on the screen behind them shows a 1 kg brick of high-grade cocaine. (Peter Lozinski/Daily Herald)

The largest cocaine bust in Prince Albert history took place last August and took more than $1 million of pure cocaine off the street. It took police more than four months to track down the six people responsible. Yesterday, they revealed the details of the drug seizure.

On Aug. 18 police responded to a report from management of an apartment building in the 1400 block of 28 Street East. Management had entered an unoccupied apartment and found what they believed to be evidence of drugs and packaging material.

When police arrived to investigate they found 11.25 kg of cocaine, including eight 1 kg bricks of high-grade cocaine, as well as a quantity of crack cocaine.

They also found several kg of two cutting agents, Procaine and Phenacetin a cocaine press, a vacuum sealer, a scale, a safe and drug packaging material.

Procaine, one of the cutting agents found, is a white, powdery substance used as a local anaesthetic. It mimics the effects of cocaine.

Phenacetin is a painkiller banned in Canada in the early 1970s due to its links to cancer and kidney damage.

The safe had some of the crack cocaine inside.

After several months of investigation, six people were charged with possession of cocaine for the purposes of trafficking:

  • Trevor McKay, 27, due in court Jan. 20
  • Darci Stene, 25, due in court April 10
  • Shaid Heimbecker, 19, due in court March 29
  • Madison Kaso, 25, due in court Jan. 10
  • Rose Hunter, 22, due in court March 29
  • And Kelsey Bear, who is still at large and wanted by police.

For more on this story please see the Jan. 10 print or e-edition of the Daily Herald.

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