A man from Fortune man has been sentenced to 18 months in jail for trying to steal copper wire from a Newfoundland Power substation.

The incident in October 2019 forced the utility to cut power to Grand Bank and Fortune for about 10 hours as they worked to safely restore service to the area.

A two-man crew had been sent to the substation just south of Grand Bank on a Thursday morning after reports of sporadic outages.

They arrived to find a black car backed up to a hole that had been cut in the fence, with three men stripping and cutting copper ground wire and putting it in the trunk.

The trio scattered on foot as the big blue and yellow Power truck pulled up, blocking their escape by car.

A short time later 30-year-old Brandon Boland emerged from the woods to retrieve his car, telling police he’d been moose hunting all morning — albeit without a gun or a licence, not to mention out of season.

Police also found pliers, wire strippers, copper wire, and a pair of bolt cutters in the trunk of his car.

Boland was convicted of several offences, including mischief causing actual danger to life — a rarely laid charge that carries the same maximum penalty as murder: namely life in prison.

Justice Garrett Handrigan said it reflected the risk of electrocution for anyone at the scene, as well as the 10-hour power outage endured by both towns.

In the end, he sentenced Boland to a total of 18 months, minus four months’ time already served, for his “thoughtless gamble that placed so many lives at risk.”