By Keith Lacey
The long arm of the law finally caught up to a Toronto man who committed an armed robbery at a Sudbury pizza joint eight years ago.
Michael Carlson, 30, pleaded guilty Wednesday to armed robbery and failing to appear in court in relation to a June 24, 1994 armed robbery at a Sudbury Pizza Hut.
Court heard Carlson was a drug addict who needed some quick cash and decided to rob a Sudbury Pizza Hut outlet with an imitation handgun. At one point, he placed the weapon to the cheek of a young female employee and ordered her to hand over the cash receipts. He left the establishment with just under $3,600 in cash.
Court heard Carlson somehow managed to go straight following the robbery, has worked over the past years while managing to avoid police.
Four days after the Sudbury robbery, Carlson was arrested in Toronto on another matter and confessed to Toronto police about the robbery, but he was released on bail. He didn?t show up for court a month later and has managed to avoid police for the past eight years.
Justice Guy Mahaffy reluctantly agreed to a joint submission presented by defence counsel Andrew Buttazzoni and assistant Crown attorney Philip Zylberberg that Carlson receive a one-year jail sentence.
Under current laws, any armed robbery while in possession of a handgun, be it real or imitation, draws a minimum four-year penitentiary sentence.
?I don?t like it,? said Mahaffy. ?I can only imagine the terror that young woman felt with a gun pressed against her face.?
However, another judge agreed to the one-year jail sentence at a pre-trial hearing and the system is designed so that presiding judges should accept joint submissions unless they?re convinced the administration of justice would be put into disrepute, said Mahaffy.
If he had been the pre-trial judge, he never would have agreed to the one-year sentence proposal, but he wasn?t and he reluctantly acceded to the request noting Carlson did turn his life around, has pleaded guilty and spared his victims from testifying at trial.
In addition to the jail term, Mahaffy placed Carlson on probation for 18 months, ordered him to submit a DNA sample for a national crime bank and prohibited him from owning or possessing any restricted firearm for 10 years.
Zylberberg told the court the robbery occurred around 1:30 am. Carlson was pulling on a balaclava over his face when a patron was leaving the restaurant.
Carlson pointed the gun, which appears to have been a realistic-looking imitation handgun, and told the man ?don?t f?with me? and ordered him back inside.
Two staff members were still working and Carlson demanded to know where the cash was, and placed two men and the young woman inside the room before placing the $3,600 in a black pouch, said Zylberberg.
Before taking off, Carlson tried to place all three of his victims inside a cold storage unit, but he couldn?t lock it and they didn?t have to spend any time inside once Carlson left the premises.
Four days later on an unrelated matter in Toronto, Carlson was questioned and officers there somehow managed to get information from him about the Sudbury robbery, said Zylberberg.
Carlson told police how he disposed of clothing he was wearing during the robbery and Sudbury police searched and found the clothing, he said.
Buttazzoni said his client was a drug addict at the time, but he somehow managed to clean up his life and gain employment following this incident.
He?s worked as a manager for a market research company and was so successful a competitor hired him only two months ago.
His employer knows about his involvement in this serious crime and that Carlson is going to have to go to jail, but has promised him future employment once his sentence is served, said Buttazzoni.
?Drug abuse was a serious problem at the time and he was short of money,? he said.
His client knew his day of reckoning would come sooner or later and actually feels a big burden has been lifted from his shoulders , he said.
Carlson was caught a month ago when Toronto police were talking to him about a non-criminal matter. A police check discovered Carlson was wanted for the Sudbury robbery. He was transferred here and has spent the past month at the Sudbury District Jail.
The only evidence against Carlson was his confession and there were serious issues regarding the manner in which Toronto police got the information from him and whether his rights had been violated, said Buttazzoni.
?There were very triable issues at trial?his plea is crucial?he could have waited three or four months and there?s a very good chance there could have been an acquittal,? he said.
