It turns out crime does pay – just not for those you’d expect.
A retiring Thunder Bay Police Service officer came across more than $19,000 he seized in two separate 2010 incidents, which will be used to purchase a new vehicle for the police’s court division.
“The Police Services Act allows us to put that back into our coffers,” said police Chief J.P. Levesque.
“We do need a vehicle at the courthouse for court services people so it’s going into a capital reserve fund to purchase a vehicle.”
On Feb. 1, 2010, local officers seized $12,435 in Canadian currency plus $1,503 American dollars bundled in a Maxwell House coffee can and a Delux paint can.
Police said a woman who claimed the luggage in which the cash was packaged provided officers with an inconsistent story as to how much money there was and how she acquired it.
She left the local police’s jurisdiction and has since made no attempt to contact the detachment.
Four months later, police seized $5,755 in Canadian currency in a parole violation investigation.
Police found a male passenger in a vehicle with British Columbia plates had the money stashed in two separate bundles.
All the vehicle’s occupants denied ownership of the money, yet none would identify its rightful owner to police.
Police seized the cash after discovering its occupants had histories of organized crime affiliation.
Citizens have 90 days to appeal seized assets by Ontario law but Levesque pointed out that because no proceeds of crime charges were laid in either incident, anyone claiming that money could have opened criminal investigations.
“They knew if they didn’t deny knowledge of the money, we were going to charge them criminally so I don’t think they had much choice,” he said.
