This article was last updated on April 16, 2022
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The Charbonneau Commission has recently learned from a new witness that the current mayor of Laval, along with a large number of the sitting municipal council, knowingly indulged in illegal fundraising schemes for the sake of getting their party richer in the late 1990s and early 2000s. These scandalous allegations were made by Jean Bertrand, who served as the official agent for the Parti PRO des Lavallois from 1984 to 2012. Bertrand was among the 37 men arrested by the provincial anti-corruption almost three weeks ago.
Bertrand stated that while he was a member of the Laval’s most influential municipal party, he witnessed almost every PRO des Lavallois councillor participating in the so-called “straw man” scheme. He explained the scheme was a method of contributing financially to the party via cheque within the limits of the law and then receiving cash from local engineering firms as reimbursement. He added that the councilors even asked for tax receipts of their ‘donations’ at the year’s end. Bertrand alleged that “I told them that what they were doing was illegal, they knew that,” adding “but they did it anyway.”
Bertrand testified that the councilors involved in the scheme included Jean-Jacques Beldié, Benoit Fradet, Basile Angelopoulos, Jocelyne Guertin, André Boileau and current Laval mayor Alexandre Duplessis. He confessed that, Robert Plante was the only one PRO councillor who allegedly refused to cooperate. When it was learned that Laval’s former mayor, Gilles Vaillancourt, was not involved, Bertrand was inquired if Vaillancourt was aware of the illegal donations, to which he replied that “there wasn’t much Mr. Vaillancourt wasn’t aware of.”
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