MANDEL: Self-confessed mastermind in Pearson gold heist trial suddenly can’t remember anything

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In the end, the Crown’s star witness against one of the gold heist suspects didn’t amount to much.

Arsalan Chaudhary, the self-confessed mastermind behind the brazen $22.5-million gold and cash heist from an Air Canada cargo warehouse three years ago, had sudden memory loss recently when it came time to testify against one of his alleged accomplices, Parmpal Sidhu.

Chaudhary was brought to Maplehurst detention centre from Joyceville Penitentiary, where he’s serving a four-year sentence. But when it came time to testify, he suddenly claimed amnesia.

He told the judge-alone trial before Superior Court Justice Gordon Cudjoe that after the heist, he’d been kidnapped and tortured by his captors in Pakistan and his freedom had cost him all of his ill-gotten gains. Now he was suffering from PTSD and combined with his harrowing three weeks in Maplehurst without being able to sleep or access his medication, he was unable to remember what happened three years ago.

Just asking him to read the agreed statement of facts from his guilty plea earlier this year was too triggering for him.

“He did not necessarily recant. He just refused to remember,” the judge noted wryly. “He needed more time to heal.”

So prosecutors Jelena Vlacic and Tyler Powell went about it another way — they asked Cudjoe to consider as evidence what Chaudhary had said when he pleaded guilty earlier this year: he admitted speaking to Sidhu three times on April 17, 2023, the day of the heist, and that he’d used the Air Canada employee as a go-between with the other suspected organizer, Sidhu’s boss, Simran Preet Panesar.

Chaudhary had also said that after the theft, Sidhu had texted him and asked: “You managed to melt all that gold yet. LOL.”

Sidhu’s defence lawyer Shale Wagman didn’t want anything admitted from Chaudhary’s guilty plea, arguing the facts he’d admitted to were self-serving and meant to deflect attention from others closer to him, especially his brother.

In his decision, the judge said he would consider that Chaudhary had communicated three times on the day of the heist with Sidhu but not the text about melting gold. Cudjoe found it wasn’t reliable since there was no phone number or any other evidence to corroborate that the message had actually come from Sidhu’s phone.

There remains plenty of other circumstantial evidence in the case that the Crown is expected to rely on — but no smoking gun, or pointing finger.

Court heard Sidhu worked as a customer service representative and was on his dinner break while working a double shift on the day of the gold theft. The shipment had arrived earlier that day on a flight from Zurich and was supposed to be picked up by Brinks.

Court hears of doctored waybill

Instead, a few hours earlier that evening, a white tractor trailer driven by Durante King McLean drove up to the warehouse on Britannia Rd. E. and presented a doctored waybill that had changed the cargo from “valuable” to “fish” destined to a seafood company. The 400 kg container of 99.9% pure gold and currency, valued at $22.5 million, was loaded on to his truck and he drove away to a rendezvous with Chaudhary.

Suspicion quickly fell on Sidhu, explained Peel Regional Police Det. Sarah Angevine, because the waybill had been printed at the warehouse using his employee id number. After months of surveillance and wiretaps, where he is captured complaining about not getting his “cut,” Sidhu was arrested April 5, 2024.

His lawyer said he wouldn’t be calling any evidence — but he used his cross-examination of Angevine to lay out his case.

Wagman suggested anyone could have used Sidhu’s employee number to print the bogus waybill. “Were you aware of employees’ credentials appearing in system logs when they weren’t even at work?”

“Yes,” she replied.

Angevine also agreed the fingerprints and handwriting found on the doctored waybill didn’t belong to his client.

The lawyer then asked whether there was a security camera in the warehouse. The detective said there was one by the printer — but it wasn’t working that day.

“So there’s no video evidence of Mr. Sidhu printing the bill or handling the bill?” Wagman asked.

“Correct. Whoever picked it up from the printer was not captured on video.”

Closing submissions are scheduled for next month.

mmandel@postmedia.com

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