(Ottawa) The Crown believes that Cameron Jay Ortis, a former intelligence official with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), should be sentenced to an exemplary prison term for violating the Canadian Information Protection Act.
At the sentencing hearing Thursday in Ottawa, prosecutor Judy Kliewer told Ontario Superior Court Justice Robert Maranger that the sentence should send a clear message that any disclosure of secret documents has serious consequences.
Cameron Jay Ortis was convicted by a jury in November of three counts of violating the Information Protection Act and one count of attempting to do so. Each of these charges is punishable by up to 14 years in prison.
Prosecutor Kliewer argued in court Thursday that the Crown was seeking the maximum, consecutive sentence for the first two counts of violating the law, which would mean 28 years in prison.
The jury also found Ortis guilty of breach of trust and fraudulent use of a computer.
Mark Ertel, a lawyer for Ortis, has already indicated that the defense will argue that his client has already served enough time behind bars in pretrial detention.
After his arrest in late 2019, Ortis was briefly released on bail, only to be incarcerated in an Ottawa jail for more than three years. He was released on bail again in December 2022, pending trial, which took place last fall.