Trépanier expected in court as trial resumes
Just days after one of the co-accused was sidelined because of a cancer diagnosis, the Contrecoeur corruption trial will resume this week.
Quebec Court judge Yvan Poulin said Monday he expects to see Bernard Trépanier in court Tuesday alongside the six other defendants.
Poulin had postponed hearings last week at the request of Trépanier’s lawyer, who said the coaccused’s medical condition was deteriorating. But the judge said Monday that he’s been assured Trépanier can and will be in court when the trial resumes.
Trépanier and six others are charged with fraud and conspiracy in relation to the 2007 sale of the municipal Contrecoeur land to a private firm for a massive housing development. Construction Frank Catania & Associés Inc. paid $4.4 million for the property — way below its municipal assessment of $31 million.
Trépanier was the chief fundraiser for the Union Montréal municipal party, which was in power at the time of the Contrecoeur sale.
Meanwhile, Poulin rejected a motion by defence attorneys to unseal information provided by a confidential informant. The informant wrote an anonymous letter to police in 2004, implicating co-accused Frank Zampino in allegedly corrupt practices.
Zampino was the chairman of Montreal’s executive committee at the time of the Contrecoeur land deal. He sat alone in the back of the courtroom Monday morning, quietly scribbling notes into a folder.
The four other co-defendants are shareholders in Construction Frank Catania & Associés.
Zampino’s lawyers argued their client should be allowed to see the contents of the letter, given that it was used by police to obtain search warrants and gather evidence against him.
Poulin, however, said that divulging the contents could put the informant’s safety at risk.
“The chances of a reprisal (against the informant) are real and serious,” Poulin wrote in a decision published Monday.
Even police do not know who the letter’s author is, making it difficult to determine which details from the document — if they were made public — could uncover the author’s identity. Defence attorneys argue that the author doesn’t qualify as a confidential informant, given that no prior or ongoing relationship exists between this person and police.
The court deliberated on this question before determining that the author is, in fact, a police informant and should be afforded certain legal protections.
Poulin noted that the letter contained specific information whose nature is so sensitive that police controlled and restricted access to its contents. Furthermore, the judge said, the circumstances that led investigators to afford the author confidential informant status aren’t unprecedented in Canadian jurisprudence.
Witnesses familiar with the letter’s contents testified before the court during a private hearing in February. Most of their testimony remains sealed given its sensitive nature.