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Pierre Montpellier spent 2002 behind bars awaiting trial

BY KEITH LACEY It was not a good year for a former Sudbury financial adviser. Pierre Montpellier spent the entire year behind bars after being denied bail twice. He was arrested in late 2001.
BY KEITH LACEY

It was not a good year for a former Sudbury financial adviser. Pierre Montpellier spent the entire year behind bars after being denied bail twice. He was arrested in late 2001.

It?s expected Montpellier, 40, will have to spend several more months in jail awaiting trial on charges of bilking dozens of former clients of more than $6 million.

Justice Ian Gordon denied bail for Montpellier at a bail review hearing which took three full days of court time over two weeks.

Justice of the peace Charles Sanders had originally denied bail for Montpellier saying he was too great a flight risk following his original bail hearing in the spring of 2002.

The popular financial adviser left Sudbury for England in December 1998 when stories about clients worried about their investments started to appear in the media.

Altogether, Montpellier was arrested in England and transported back to Sudbury to face charges.

Montpellier faces 302 charges?151 of fraud over $5,000 and 151 of theft over $5,000?after allegedly stealing close to $6 million from 108 investors between 1995 and 1998.

Lawyer Glenn Sandberg acknowledged this case involves thousands of pages of documentation ?with thousands more to come,? a three-year police investigation and will take several more months to prepare for trial.

?You don?t do a case like this to get it done and out of the way,? he said. ?The fact is you have to take your time and be thorough and get it done right and that?s going to take some time.?

It?s expected Montpellier will go to trial in the first few months of 2003.

Montpellier was a licensed mutual fund and limited market dealer operating a company known as Montpellier Group Inc. in Sudbury from 1995 until his departure for Europe in 1998.

During the same time period Montpellier incorporated Foreign Capital Corp. as an investment vehicle to raise money from investors to be used in international investments, say police.

Some 108 investors from all parts of Ontario put funds in the company believing their money was being invested overseas in a guaranteed and secure venture with interest on the investments being paid on a regular basis. When investors didn?t receive any payments, they contacted several police agencies in the province to complain.

At the time of his arrest Montpellier had been working overseas for an London employment agency as a recruiter, matching clients with jobs.

After a lengthy police investigation, Montpellier was arrested in England in a town called Sutton and arrived back in Canada Nov. 1, 2001.

During an initial court appearance in London, Montpellier waived his right to an extradition hearing and was remanded in custody.


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