Gordie Bests Story

Gordie Best is dead.
The Gordie Best who walked into businesses and committed armed robberies is dead. The Gordie Best who spent the better part of his life in jail is dead. The Gordie Best who abused drugs and alcohol is dead. “The old Gordie is a dead man,” Yarmouth County resident Randall Cook said recently, sitting in the witness box of a Yarmouth courtroom, testifying on Best’s behalf. “What we see today is the same body. It looks like Gordie Best but what I can tell you today is it’s a brand new man.” And the new Gordie Best has never felt more alive.
 
Based on his past and his criminal record, 46-year-old Best should be sitting in a federal prison cell. That’s where he found himself in April 2001 after he was sentenced to four years in prison for an armed robbery at the Rodd Colony Inn. In a Yarmouth courtroom a couple of months ago, Best faced the possibility of prison again. Another four years of prison for an armed robbery at a convenience store on Argyle Street.
 
But something had changed......

Sylvain Blainchette's Story

When Sylvain Blainchette discovered alcohol at age 13 with friends from school, he had no idea how drinking would tear his life apart, or how long it would take to rebuild it. Sylvain lived with his maternal grandparents in Saint Hyacinthe, a small town near Montreal, Quebec. “By drinking and smoking and experimenting with drugs, I wanted to prove I was a man,” Sylvain says. He was interested in Christianity, however, and his faith helped stabilize his life. After getting married and having children, The Blainchette’s were the picture of a happy, churchgoing family. “But we started experiencing problems around the seven or eight-year mark,” he explained. “Around the 10-year mark, I began to drink again, and at the 12-year mark, we got a divorce....