Verdict still months away in protracted fraud trial
KITCHENER — Many of the alleged victims in the fraud and theft trial of Daniel P. Reeve were visibly upset Monday when they learned they will have to wait another four months before they get a verdict in the protracted trial.
“That is ridiculous,” said Caren Smith, who drove in from Acton in hopes of hearing a verdict in the case. She sat in the courtroom from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m., when Justice Toni Skarica said he would deliver his verdict in October.
“It’s just so frustrating,” Smith said. “This should already have been long done.”
Reeve, the former owner of Cambridge-based DPR Financial Inc., has pleaded not guilty to fraud over $5,000 and theft over $5,000. If convicted, he could get 14 years in prison for fraud and 10 years for theft.
The prosecution alleges 41 investors lost a total of $10 million, making it one of the biggest alleged frauds ever in Waterloo Region. Many former investors say they lost their life savings before his firm failed.
But Stephanie Moxey of Kitchener, a single mother who says she lost her $250,000 divorce settlement after investing it with Reeve’s company, said she’s OK with the delay.
“If it takes longer, I would
rather the judge come to the best conclusion … I would just hope we come back in October and that will be the end of it.”
Monday was just two days short of the two-year anniversary of the start of the trial, which has run intermittently since June 8, 2015. When it began, the trial by judge alone was expected to last four to five months.
The trial has heard testimony from more than 70 witnesses and filed 332 exhibits. Often there were no spectators in court, other than media covering the trial, but on Monday about a dozen people came to hear what they hoped was a verdict.
Testimony wrapped up in January, after which prosecution and defence lawyers were given time to submit written final arguments in the complex financial case. Two days in court had been set aside, Monday and Tuesday, to address those final arguments and to respond to any questions the judge had.
On Monday afternoon, the judge said he would need time to write his judgment, and asked the lawyers to find a date in October when he would deliver it.
“My judgment will be massive,” he said, noting it would likely end up being about 1,000 pages long, though he intends to read out a shorter summary when he delivers the verdict. “I’ve gone through everything with a finetoothed comb,” he said, adding that it was important to do a thorough assessment of all the evidence, both for Reeve and for the 41 investors in the case.
Reeve was arrested in July 2012 while working as a paint clerk in a Home Depot in Collingwood. He has been in jail since then, as nobody would post his bail after he was arrested.
By the time the verdict is delivered in October, Reeve, 57, will have been in jail for more than five years.
That’s one silver lining Moxey sees from the long trial. “Even if he’s not found guilty, at least he has spent all that time in jail.”