By Spencer Sterritt

7-year sentence handed to driver for 2016 drive-by shooting and police chase

Feb 7, 2019 | 2:05 PM

NANAIMO — The man allegedly behind the wheel of a brazen daytime drive-by shooting will spend the next seven years behind bars.

Inderpal Aujla was sentenced on Thursday to seven years in prison for attempted murder and fleeing police in 2016. He and another man were arrested after firing nine shots into a parked car on Wakesiah Rd. near Jingle Pot Rd. and leading police on a lengthy and dramatic chase to Duncan. The man inside the car was not the intended target and was caught up in a case of mistaken identify. A motive for the shooting and who was supposed to be murdered is still unknown.

The second man allegedly in the car, Armaan Singh Chandi, pleaded not guilty and a decision in his case will be made on Monday, Feb. 11.

Crown prosecutor Nick Barber said the seven year sentence is on the low end of punishment for attempted murder.

Barber said there were numerous aggravating factors for the daytime shooting in a busy area.

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“Across the street from where the shooting occurred is a daycare which was in session. On the same side of the street is a large number of residential units and businesses. There were pedestrians in the area at the time. Aquatic centre and high school are just down the hill and would be busy around that time as well.”

After the shooting, which wasn’t successful against a target who was apparently misidentified, Aujla and Chandi led police on a high-stakes chase to Duncan.

The pursuit started on Cedar Rd. and nearly ended in Ladysmith when police blocked their car. But Aujla managed to maneuver his way through while damaging many police cars. Barber said one officer sustianed a broken neck from the chase.

They were eventually caught and arrested in Duncan.

Aujla hadn’t been in trouble with police before the 2016 incident.

Defence lawyer Paul Dutt painted a picture of a man adrift after high school who fell in with the wrong crowd. He said Aujla was impressionable and made a dumb decision to be in the car with a man alleged to be Chandi.

He also stressed Aujla was the man behind the wheel, not the man who pulled the trigger.

“It may not be a mitigating factor but it should be qualified as an absense of an aggravating factor.”

Aujla and his parents briefly hugged and said their goodbyes before he was led out of the courtroom in handcuffs.

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