White beats Quebec tax charge, ready for constitutional challenge

Derek White was acquitted of defrauding the Quebec government of taxes, but guilty of breaking the Exise Tax Act. A constitutional challenge in January will appeal that charge. (Daniel J. Rowe, The Eastern Door)

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This story is updated from the one printed in today’s Eastern Door (vol. 28 no. 19), as the jury’s decision came after press time.

Derek White was acquitted of one charge, and found guilty of another yesterday in a Longueuil Palais de Justice courtroom.

The 12 young men and women of the jury found White not guilty of defrauding the Quebec government of $44 million in taxes, while finding him guilty of fraud in relation to the federal excise duty owed for importing loose leaf tobacco.

Monday, justice Sophie Bourque spent the day instructing the jurors on the details of the case, going through the evidence and explaining points of law on the fraud an gangsterism charges. 

The jurors were then sequestered to deliberate, and came back with the decision shortly after 4 p.m. yesterday.

The guilty federal charge means the men were also found guilty of being a part of a criminal organization along with Montour. Criminal organization, as defined by the Canadian Criminal Code, means “a group, however organized, that is composed of three or more persons in or outside Canada; and has as one of its main purposes or main activities the facilitation or commission of one or more serious offences that, if committed, would likely result in the direct or indirect receipt of a material benefit, including a financial benefit, by the group or by any of the persons who constitute the group.”

Tuesday, the two sides set up a schedule for the constitutional challenge White’s lawyers will launch beginning January 16.T

danielr@ed.quanglo.ca

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