Quebec has long list of prison escapees
Laveaux François, a Haitian-born Canadian citizen who for years managed to smuggle cocaine out of the Caribbean into the U.S., returned to Canada this month for the first time in 23 years. He did not return home of his own free will. He was transferred from the custody of the Department of Homeland Security in the U.S. to Canadian authorities. He was returned to a federal penitentiary similar to the one in Laval that he vanished from in May 1995 while serving a 15-year sentence for cocaine smuggling. After disappearing while out on a day pass, he headed to Haiti to resume what he apparently does best. When he was returned to Canada Dec. 4, François’s name was taken off a very long list. According to information obtained by the Montreal Gazette, François was one of 118 people listed this year by Correctional Service Canada as having either escaped from federal penitentiaries based in Quebec or to have gone “unlawfully at large” after having been “released to the community on day parole, full parole statutory release or a longterm supervision order for whom a warrant of suspension has been issued but has not yet been executed.” Correctional Service Canada used the date of the Montreal Gazette’s request for information, April 20, as its reference point for the information the newspaper obtained. According to the report, 118 federal offenders (with sentences of two years or longer) serving their sentences in Quebec were being sought on warrants. The number is significantly less than the list of 230 people CSC supplied to the Montreal Gazette in 2005 based on a similar Access to Information request. Canadian authorities knew where François was as of July 16, 2007, when U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration officers and Haitian police carried out a series of raids, including a dramatic military operation that was part of a failed attempt to arrest a Haitian drug trafficker who had helped topple former Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide. According to the Miami Herald, at the time of his arrest François was alleged to have “led an organization out of the city of Gonaïves that transported cocaine from Haiti to the United States between 2004 and 2006.” François was quickly extradited to the U.S., and in December 2007 he was convicted of being part of at least a few attempts to smuggle large amounts of cocaine hidden in vessels that had docked in Florida. He was originally sentenced to a 400-month prison term (about 33 years) but that sentence was dramatically reduced in October to 158 months (about 13 years). A document filed by François’s lawyer in a U.S. district court in Florida reveals the American government recommended his sentence be reduced, in 2007, “in recognition of his substantial assistance in each of his three cases.” His return to Canada makes Laveaux eligible for release much sooner than if he had stayed in the U.S. Inmates serving time in American federal penitentiaries are not eligible for parole and are required to serve at least 85 per cent of their sentences behind bars. In Canada, federal offenders are eligible for full parole after they have served one-third of their sentence. Despite having gone unlawfully at large more than two decades ago, François’s time on the list was far from the longest. Armand Latraverse, a robber who turned 95 this year if he is still alive, escaped from a penitentiary in 1972. François is also not the only significant drug trafficker on the list. Roberto Sorenti, a Montrealer who would now be 53 years old, disappeared on Feb. 4, 1998, while serving a 13-year prison term he received in 1995. Sorenti had pleaded guilty to being part of a conspiracy to smuggle more than 5,300 kilograms of cocaine into Canada through Shelburne, N.S. It is still considered one of the biggest drug busts in Canada and the shipment was co-ordinated by Montrealers who were tied to the Rizzuto organization. Also on the list are Milos Ales, who would now be 57, and Pierre Charette, who would be 56. Both men were leaders in a conspiracy to bring large quantities of cocaine into Canada on trucks used to import fruit into Canada during the 1990s. Ales and Charette were sentenced to 15- and 14-year prison terms respectively on Sept. 1, 1995. Charette escaped on Nov. 9, 1996, and Ales escaped from a minimum-security penitentiary in 2001. Only 21 of the 118 people on the list supplied by CSC escaped from penitentiaries, like Latraverse, or disappeared while on leaves from such institutions, like François. The other 97 disappeared while on parole or some other form of release. The names of those people were redacted from the document supplied to the Montreal Gazette.