Fentanyl bust results in charges against Calgary man

A 27-year-old Calgary man who is the son of a former B.C. MLA has been charged with importing a controlled substance after border guards foundfentanylin a parcel meant for a Calgary address.

Kasimir Tyabji-Sandana, 27, of Calgary, made a brief court appearance on August 17 and was ordered back in court on September 16 to consider a bail application. He remains in custody.

The investigation began on July 14, when a border agent at the Vancouver International Mail Centre intercepted a parcel declared as a muffler. The agent discovered a white powder suspected to befentanyland sent it to a lab for confirmation.

RCMPthenworked with Calgary police to further the investigation, resulting in Tyabji-Sandana's arrest on July 22, when 122 grams offentanylwas seized, with an estimated value of $348,000.

Son of former B.C. MLA JudiTyabji

Tyabji-Sandana's mother JudiTyabji was the youngestMLA in the B.C. Legislature when she was elected in 1991 and went on to become the first woman to have a child while in office.

But her subsequent affair with then-leader Gordon Wilson rocked the party in1993. The pair went on to marry and founded a new party, the Progressive Democratic Alliance, which folded after the 1996 election.

Tyabjilost custody of her three children in 1994 to her ex-husband Kim Sandana.

She iscurrently an environmental activist andpresident of thePebble In the Pond Environmental Society,a community group dedicated to the reduction of plastic garbage waste.

When CBC reached Wilson on Thursday, he said neither he nor his wife would be commenting on the arrest. Tyabji could not be reached directly for comment.

Fentanyl seizures on the rise

Calgary police have seen34 incidents involvingfentanylseizuresin 2015, compared to just 12 in 2014. Fatalities attributed to the drug havealso increased dramatically.

Police and health officials are trying to raise awareness of the harmful drug and alerting casual drug users, as well as entrenched addicts, thatfentanylis often disguised or mixed with other drugs, and can be fatal in small doses.