Constable denies taking credit cards from dead people
Suspended officer faces theft, fraud, obstruction of justice charges
A Toronto police officer has admitted he searched police databases a dozen times for information on vehicles belonging to a friend — but Const. Boris Borissov denied he stole a luxury watch and two credit cards from dead people.
Testifying in a Toronto court on Tuesday, Borissov, 50, said his friend Zvezdomir Mollov approached him in 2020 with a business plan: the man would buy cars, export them to Europe and sell them there, or rent them out in partnership with Borissov through the Turo car-sharing app.
“To me, it sounded like a good business,” Borissov explained. “But to make sure that the vehicle was clean, that there was nothing on it, I decided to run the plates,” he said, testifying in his own defence.
“I had to make sure that this would not bring disgrace to the Toronto police.”
Borissov is facing charges including theft, fraud or breach of trust by an official, obstruction of justice, possession of property obtained by crime exceeding $5,000, and fraudulently obtaining a computer service. He has plead not guilty to all of them.
The officer, who first joined the Toronto Police in December 2005, has been suspended with pay since February 2022.
The Crown has argued Borissov stole a luxury TAG Heuer watch and two credit cards — one from BMO and the other from TD — from two people whose deaths he was assigned to investigate, and also alleges he was driving a stolen vehicle for months.
On the stand before Ontario Court Judge Mary Misener, Borissov said he did not take the watch and cards and denied using them to rack up charges that were recorded after both cardholders had died.
His lawyer Joanne Mulcahy noted that some of the charges made on the BMO card — used at an LCBO, Starbucks, Home Depot and a Domino’s Pizza in the days after the cardholder’s death in 2020 — occurred when Borissov was working on-duty in another part of the GTA, although some of the charges occurred on his day off.
Although the BMO card was never recovered, photos of it were found on Borissov’s phone following his arrest in 2022. (On Tuesday, Borissov testified he deleted those photos following the investigation into the woman’s death in 2020.)
The Crown has argued that Borissov gave a dead man’s TD credit card to Mollov, who was seen using the card at a butcher shop one day after Borissov began working on the investigation into the cardholder’s death.
Borissov said he had found the man’s wallet inside a jacket at the waterfront, frozen. Borissov brought the items into his squad car to warm them up before he received a call from Mollov and the two men decided to get sandwiches together.
The man’s TD credit card, Amex card and an HSBC cheque were found in a search of Mollov’s apartment two months later. When asked by Mulcahy how these items could have ended up there, Borissov said he remembers putting some items inside of his uniform while getting sandwiches, and that these items must have fallen into Mollov’s car when he pulled out his wallet to pay.
Borissov said that although he decided not to go into business with Mollov, he did agree to purchase a car from him — a Honda Pilot that the Crown alleges was stolen.
Court records show Honda Canada attempted to repossess the Pilot in January 2021 — but a tracking device placed on the car by a bailiff was later found by U.S. authorities after it had been attached to a transport vehicle that travelled into New York state.
When Toronto police seized the Honda Pilot during an April 2022 search, they found a GPS jammer in the cigarette port.
On Tuesday, Borissov said he was not aware that the car was stolen, and that the GPS jammer belonged to Mollov. The other man, Borissov claimed, was afraid “organized crime groups would come after him” due to his work as an airport baggage handler and cannabis delivery person.
Last week, the court heard from two construction workers who say Borissov attempted to sell them the TAG Heuer watch, which the Crown says Borissov stole from the deceased man.
Borissov is also facing police misconduct charges for his alleged offences which are paused pending the outcome of this trial, along with charges for allegedly attempting to smuggle $10,000 worth of Cuban cigars into Canada while on bail.
The trial continues Wednesday.