House arrest sentence handed to beekeeper

A Hanover man has received his sentence after pleading guilty to owning four handguns and ammunition.

Lloyd Brian Neufeld pleaded guilty in July to owning the unlicensed guns claiming he had them to defend his bee hives against bears. Senior Judge Robert Heinrichs gave Neufeld a two-year conditional sentence, two years of supervised probation, and 40 hours of community service.

In his decision, Heinrichs said the danger to the public was “significantly lessened” by the fact that the guns were locked in a safe that only Neufeld had the combination to, and that they were stored separately from the other firearms.

“This is a case where the firearms that are the subject of the guilty pleas – the handguns – were not displayed in a threatening manner, were not fired or used in any manner, where there is no suggestion that they were used as prime guns in any way and the hand guns were not found on the accused, but were found by the RCMP securely locked in a safe,” said Heinrichs.

“This court finds that the least restrictive and proportionate sentence which can be imposed is a lengthy conditional sentence with probation to follow,” he added.

In August 2023, police responded to a mental health call after Neufeld’s family became concerned with his behaviour. Neufeld had struggled with previous thoughts of suicide and he had asked his oldest teenage sons to handle the weapons while not acting like himself, according to a statement of facts.

Neufeld does have a valid non-restricted PAL to use firearms. When police attended under the Mental Health Act on Aug. 17, he gave them a passcode to a large safe containing 16 shotguns and rifles.

But he refused to give the code to a small safe in his bedroom. RCMP got a search warrant and opened the safe Aug. 22 and found the four handguns with three semi-automatics having fully loaded magazines. It was not revealed where Neufeld got the guns from, as he does not have the legal right to purchase them.

Neufeld was arrested Aug. 23 and released with conditions on Aug. 25.

Crown attorney Jennifer Neufeld said it was aggravating that Neufeld asked his young teenage sons to handle handguns while in an intoxicated or mentally unstable state. Defence lawyer Jesse Blackman insisted the children were unafraid and never in any danger, only concerned for their father.

The defence also suggested the handguns were meant for defence against bears as Lloyd had a beekeeping operation. The Crown pointed out he already had plenty of long guns that would be a lot more effective.

At the time, Lloyd told the judge he sought treatment and had become sober.

“If my kids were here I’d apologize to them one more time for uprooting their life and turning to alcohol instead of counseling like I have been doing this year.

“In the past I would always try to bury my stress and my pressures in my life. And the church has been a real pressure in my life, but at the end of the day it was still my choice to deal with it the way I dealt with it,” he said.

-With files from Chris Gareau