A former employee of a Montreal firm specializing in ballistic analysis has pleaded guilty to corruption and admitted that his former employer paid bribes to a secretary of the Department of the Interior of the Philippines in order to securing a $17 million contract with the country’s police force between 2006 and 2010.
Michael McLean, a 57-year-old Beaconsfield resident, pleaded guilty on November 22, but Superior Court Judge Mario Longpré imposed a publication ban on the hearing because other accused are still waiting. their trial in this case. The publication ban was lifted on Friday, after the intervention of lawyers for The Press and Quebecor.
Mr. McLean made a career with the Montreal company Ultra Electronics Forensic Technology, which reached an agreement with the authorities to admit its wrongdoing and avoid a criminal trial last year. His admission of guilt, however, allows us to learn more about the scheme uncovered by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police investigation into this case.
Delegation received in Montreal
A summary of the facts admitted by Michael McLean and filed in court explains that the company had decided to recruit a local sales agent in the Philippines to whom it granted 30% of the total value of the contract for his assistance. In reality, a good part of this sum was to be used to bribe Philippine officials in order to convince them to grant funding to the national police to purchase ballistic recognition systems from the Montreal company.
One of the officials to whom the bribes were intended was Ronaldo Villanueva Puno, the secretary of the Department of the Interior, according to the summary of facts filed in court. A delegation of senior Philippine police officials was received in Montreal, and some of the visitors were to receive bribes, again according to the summary of the facts.
Me Isabella Teolis, the accused’s lawyer, stressed that her client was located rather at the bottom of the company hierarchy and that he had not benefited personally from the embezzlement in which he found himself involved.
The judge accepted a joint suggestion from the defense and the Crown prosecutor, Ms.e Marie-Eve Moore, for a 12-month sentence to be served in the community, rather than in prison.