‘I’m not a priest. I’m not going to lie to you’
Man pleads guilty to looting condo, says he is denied books, schooling and a low-fat diet in HMP
A man who looted the St. John’s condo he rented with his wife and shipped the furnishings to Quebec City took the stand in his own sentencing hearing Wednesday.
Dominic Delisle, 31, pleaded guilty to charges of theft over $5,000, impersonation, fleeing police and violating the terms of a sex offender registry order, and told the court he doesn’t mind paying the consequences.
“I’m not a priest. I’m not going to lie to you,” he said in a thick Quebecois accent, speaking directly to the judge at times. “At the end of the day, I won’t be able to say I was a lawyer or a doctor who helped a lot of people in the world and had a beautiful life. I made a lot of mistakes.”
Delisle and his wife rented a furnished condo in the Rabbittown neighbourhood of St. John’s last October, according to an agreed statement of facts presented in court, and Delisle signed the one-year lease under a fake name: Nicholas Sigouin.
After trying unsuccessfully to collect rent payments in February and finding the couple’s phone numbers to be out of service, the landlord entered the apartment to find it cleaned out of everything except the dishwasher, washer and dryer.
Video surveillance revealed the couple had left the apartment days earlier with the help of a moving company.
Delisle’s father, Quebec Citybased lawyer Marc Delisle, submitted an affadavit to the court saying his son had left him a voicemail, confessing to what he had done and telling him that the furnishings were in a Quebec City storage locker. Delisle agreed to let his father contact the police.
A month later, on April 9, Delisle was driving a white Jeep Compass on Torbay Road when RNC officers recognized him and attempted to arrest him. He led police on a chase before eventually ditching the vehicle and running, but was caught. He has been in jail ever since.
The items, which had an estimated total value of $30,000, were eventually shipped back to the landlord at her own cost.
Delisle has a significant criminal record dating back to when he was 19, with convictions for drug trafficking, conspiracy, assaults, weapons offences, threats, forcing teenage girls into the sex trade and living off the money they earned. His victims included girls as young as 14, and he is listed on the national sex offender registry.
He was once deemed by the Parole Board of Canada to be a danger to women, and has been
described in the past by Quebec media as a “specialist in underage prostitution.”
Delisle violated the conditions of the sex offender registry when he didn’t tell police he had moved to Newfoundland and didn’t sign in as required.
Prosecutor Jeff Summers is asking for a prison sentence for Delisle of 15 to 18 months, less the 122 days he has already served. Summers noted Delisle’s serious criminal history and the fact he had destroyed his landlord’s business and delayed her retirement with “the wanton
fleecing of the apartment” which appears to have been “solely for his benefit.” Summers also requested a two-year probation period and an order requiring Delisle to pay the landlord $16,598 to cover her costs plus her lost rental income.
When Judge James Walsh noted the lost income could be a civil matter and not a criminal one, Delisle’s lawyer, Randy Piercey, said Delisle had given him instructions not to argue for a lower repayment amount.
“I’m guilty,” Delisle later explained to the judge. “I think that missus has enough problems. I don’t want to fight for something she deserves, at the end of the day.”
Piercey pointed to Delisle’s willingness to make restitution, his guilty pleas and the fact he had confessed to his father and allowed him to call police as factors warranting a more lenient sentence of nine months minus time served.
On the stand, Delisle said he wasn’t one for complaining, but wanted to speak about the conditions inside Her Majesty’s Penitentiary (HMP). He told the court he has high cholesterol, but prison officials haven’t provided him with a low-fat menu.
“I have no problems with the Newfoundland diet, but I have a cholesterol problem and I don’t think fish and chips and fries are what you’re supposed to have,” he said.
He has not been given enough exercise time, he added, and he has been outside for recreation only five times since he was arrested.
Delisle also said prison officials cut him off from ordering books in French from Amazon, denied him the opportunity to do schooling in English and frustrated his access to his lawyers, which included contact with his father’s firm in Quebec to have court documents translated.
“I don’t mind to pay for what I did, I understand that, but you have to provide basic rights,” Delisle said. “We are in Canada, we are not in Canadakistan.”
Delisle’s wife, 34-year-old Sarah Daneault, has also been charged with theft over $5,000 in relation to the condo, and was released on bail. She has pleaded not guilty and will go to trial in December.
Walsh will deliver his sentencing verdict for Delisle on Sept. 21.