The Crown accused the defence at the Contrecoeur fraud trial on Tuesday of going on a “fishing expedition” with its motion seeking more details concerning police wiretaps that targeted one of the people charged, former Montreal city hall No. 2 man Frank Zampino, and intercepted some of his conversations with his lawyers in 2015.
However, Zampino’s lawyer, Isabel Schurman, who has called the intercepted conversations with defence lawyers a “violation of a key constitutional protection,” and the Crown resolved some of the outstanding demands in her defence motion for disclosure of evidence on Tuesday. Among other things, the Crown handed over sealed audio recordings of some of the intercepted conversations.
As well, some of the other accused in the case dropped a second defence motion that was seeking more information about the wiretaps on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, both sides are to return before Quebec Court Judge Yvan Poulin to determine how the remaining points of the motion — the 24th that has been filed since the trial began on Feb. 8, 2016 — will be dealt with so the trial can proceed.
The trial is nearing the first anniversary since it began without having heard opening arguments or any evidence, and without having heard from any witnesses.
Poulin noted on Tuesday that Schurman has raised the possibility of filing an additional motion stemming from the disclosure last week that lawyer-client conversations were intercepted.
The accused in the Contrecoeur case were arrested in May 2012 over the 2007 sale of the city-owned Faubourg Contrecoeur land to the construction firm at well below its municipal evaluation.
