The founder of the former engineering firm Groupe SM, Bernard Poulin, will remit $ 500,000 to the City of Montreal as part of an out-of-court settlement related to his alleged participation in the scandal surrounding a water meter contract, in the late 2000s.
The businessman’s name appeared in 2018 among those of several other fallen entrepreneurs, including Tony Accurso and Paolo Catania, in a lawsuit of more than $ 14 million then brought by the City of Montreal. It thus hoped to recover the money it considers to have lost due to alleged practices of collusion and rigging of tenders involving several construction companies and engineering firms in connection with the award in 2007 of a $ 356 million contract to the Génieau consortium, made up of two companies then owned by Tony Accurso.
This contract provided for the installation of 30,500 water meters in industries, businesses and institutions in the city, as well as the construction of valve chambers to optimize the city’s water network. A consortium formed by the Catania and SM groups had then filed “a submission of convenience giving the illusion of a competition”, underline documents adopted behind closed doors this week by the City’s executive committee. A situation that artificially inflated the value of the contract awarded at the end of the call for tenders process, according to the City.
However, since the announcement of this lawsuit, several of the contractors targeted by it “are in financial difficulty”, including Mr. Poulin, who went bankrupt in 2019. The latter being slow to reach an amicable agreement with the City, as did other entrepreneurs involved in this case, in March 2019 it obtained authorization from a court to be able to take as security the sum that Bernard Poulin could possibly draw from the sale of a secondary residence that the latter held through a trust.
At the end of an agreement between Mr. Poulin’s lawyers and the City, the latter finally waives this financial guarantee, since it will ultimately receive $ 500,000 from the businessman. The City thus avoids “costly and lengthy” debates before the Court on Bernard Poulin’s share of responsibility in the scandal of the water meter contract, “and the risks posed by the execution of a possible judgment” , add the documents of the executive committee.
Several charges
Recall that Mr. Poulin was arrested in 2017 by the Permanent Anti-Corruption Unit in the wake of the water meter scandal and was accused of fraud, conspiracy and corruption. Five other charges laid by the Commissioner of Canada Elections were then added to his case for illegal contributions to federal political entities, between 2004 and 2009.
The assets of Groupe SM were also almost entirely repurchased in 2018 for a sum of approximately $ 40 million. The name of the engineering firm thus disappeared after its acquisition by FNX-INNOV, a Quebec company.