CORNWALL/AKWESASNE – A former Akwesasne police officer has been given a conditional discharge after being arrested for smuggling nearly three years ago.
Justin Delormier, 32, was arrested in September 2018 at the Cornwall port of entry where the RCMP’s Cornwall Regional Task Force seized just over 10,000 flavoured cigars and 69 kilograms (152 pounds) of unstamped tobacco.
Delormier had originally been charged under the Excise Act with possession of unstamped tobacco.
A media relations advisor with the Public Prosecution Service of Canada says the Excise Act charge was withdrawn in January 2021 and police were directed to relay the information to a Criminal Code of Canada charge of defrauding the government (Section 121.1).
“Mr. Delormier plead guilty on January 26, 2021 to the CC (Criminal Code) charge before J. Kinsella (Justice Deborah Kinsella). A conviction was registered under the CC and the accused was sentenced to a conditional discharge following 12 months probation,” Nathalie Houle told Cornwall Newswatch in an email.
Those conditions include counselling as directed by a probation officer.
With a conditional discharge, a criminal conviction is not entered against the accused if certain conditions are met. Records of the offence are scrubbed three years after the date of the discharge order.
At the time of his arrest, the Akwesasne Mohawk Police Service said Delormier had been on leave since 2016. “He is no longer an employee of the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne,” it said.