Immigration fraud charges against P.E.I. motel operators halted
CHARLOTTETOWN — Immigration fraud charges were stayed Friday against two Charlottetown motel owners after it was alleged hundreds of newcomers used their hotel as an address without intending to remain on Prince Edward Island under a provincially sponsored program.
The federal prosecution service confirmed that it asked a provincial court judge to stay the charges because there wasn’t sufficient evidence to proceed against the siblings operating the Sherwood Motel.
The decision came after several days of testimony and cross-examination of a federal investigator.
In May, the Canada Border Services Agency charged Ping Zhong, 60, with three counts of aiding and abetting misrepresentation under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, and five charges were laid against her 58-year-old brother, Yi Zhong.
Defence lawyer Lee Cohen said the Crown failed to produce evidence that either of his clients assisted seven Chinese immigrants named in the charges to misrepresent themselves to immigration officials.
The lawyer said his clients had no knowledge of what those using the hotel intended to do after coming to Canada and using the hotel as a temporary mailing address.
“They had no consultation with … lawyers or consultants who were assisting these seven Chinese nationals to immigrate to Prince Edward Island,” he said.
“They had no prior knowledge … of anybody’s intentions and so in the absence of being able to connect those dots, the Crown can’t get a conviction.”
The federal prosecutor was unavailable for comment on the reasons for seeking the stay, but a spokeswoman sent a statement saying it was due to a lack of sufficient evidence.
The siblings had been charged under section 126 of the act, which requires the Crown to show that they acted in a way that would “induce an error in the administration” of the federal immigration law.
The CBSA had alleged 566 immigrants used the same two addresses between 2008 and 2015 — the Sherwood and Ping Zhong’s Charlottetown home.
Cohen said he has no idea if that number was correct.
However, he said his clients had seen a legal business opportunity to provide the temporary address to newcomers as a mailing address, and that this use of a mailing address is not uncommon.
“There should never have been any charges against them.”