A Kelowna man has been ordered to pay a $5,000 nice for flying a drone through the McDougall Creek wildfire in 2023.
Derek Leippi was sentenced in provincial court docket Monday after being charged underneath the Wildfire Act for interfering with a helicopter responding to the hearth. He was discovered responsible on Feb. 9.
He was set to be sentenced on Feb. 24, however Justice Cathaline Heinrich reserved her resolution till March 23, saying she wanted extra time.
The Crown was calling for a $15,000 nice and a public apology.
Leippi, who represented himself, requested for a lot extra leniency with a small nice or no nice in any respect.
Throughout sentence submissions in February, Leippi informed the choose he has already paid a value as a result of the media consideration has impacted his skilled popularity as a realtor.
The drone incident occurred on Aug. 27, 2023 — 10 days after the wildfire erupted.
Leippi was flying his small drone off a ship on Okanagan Lake, close to the fire-ravaged Okanagan Lake Resort, to seize footage.
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He beforehand informed court docket he was unaware that firefighting plane had been working within the space till he noticed a helicopter arrive to select up water.
He admitted he made a mistake however added he didn’t imply to intrude with the emergency response.
Whereas Justice Heinrich did discover Leippi’s actions distracted the helicopter pilot for a short time, she stated she took into consideration mitigating elements, together with this being Leippi’s first offence and him being cooperative and respectful when authorities approached him on the boat that day.
The choose famous she believes the nice is robust sufficient on this case to discourage others from committing the sort of offence.
“I’ll actually depart it to the courts to determine how finest to reply and on this case, they’ve responded,” stated Ravi Parmar, B.C.’s minister of forests. “I respect the court docket’s resolution.”
However with one other wildfire season quick approaching, Parmar had sturdy phrases for anybody pondering of flying a drone close to wildfires.
Don’t fly your drones and put the lives of British Columbians which can be so heroic in preventing these fires on the road,” Parmar stated.
“We’ve bought pilots. We’ve bought folks on the bottom, boots on the bottom, defending folks and communities each single day throughout wildfire season and for anybody to do the silly factor of flying a drone, I hope the court docket holds them accountable.”
Crown was additionally calling for Leippi to make a public apology however the choose stated she accepts the regret Leippi expressed in court docket and no additional motion is important.
Leippi appeared in court docket on video for Monday’s sentencing.
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