A former public works employee with the city of Port Coquitlam will do no jail time after he was sentenced today (Thursday) for stealing copper piping from the municipality.
Port Coquitlam provincial court Judge Shehni Dossa gave the “rare and exceptional sentence” of an absolute discharge to Harold Lewis following his guilty plea last month.
An absolute discharge means no conviction is registered and the accused is not given any conditions to follow such as a probation order.
In her decision, Dossa said she took into consideration Lewis’ 35-year service with the cities of Vancouver, Coquitlam and Port Coquitlam — the latter for 12 years before he was fired — as well as his character references, his self-imposed community work with the SPCA and the “shame and humiliation” of having the matter brought to public attention.
Dossa also reiterated both the Crown and defence counsel’s assertion that there was no clear policy — or direction from management — that city employees could not to take scrap metals or materials paid for with tax dollars and owned by the municipality.
The judge, who also noted Lewis’ willingness to pay restitution to the city in the amount of $1,500, said she was satisfied the 57-year-old is at a low risk to reoffend and advised him after rendering her decision, “I hope you will not come back before the court.”
Before the ruling, Crown prosecutor Pat Beirne outlined to the judge how Lewis’ “scam” was uncovered by management when another city worker came forward with $50 Lewis had given him as a result of a copper pipe theft. The revelation from the whistleblower prompted city managers to hire a third-party investigator and to watch the public works employees in the yard.
Beirne said video footage and photos showed Lewis loading scraps of old copper piping into burlap sacks, placing them in his vehicle and transporting them to a metal recycling facility.
Between January and June 2018, the court heard, Lewis received $2,800 from the plant, the prosecutor said, with other city employees participating in the thefts also profiting. “It appears the money was going directly into the employees’ pockets,” Beirne said.
In total, a dozen public works employees faced scrutiny and seven were fired — including Lewis.
(CUPE Local 498, which represent PoCo unionized staff, is grieving the terminations of six workers; Lewis dropped his grievance after the criminal charge of theft under $5,000 was filed. A request for comment from local president Bob Smejkal was not immediately returned Thursday.)
Though he did not speak at the sentencing hearing, Lewis wrote a letter to the city to “unreservedly apologize” for his actions, Beirne said. “It’s an experience that I intend to learn and grow from,” Lewis wrote.
Defence lawyer Michael Bolton said the city had “no specific policy” around scrap materials, and the selling of salvaged copper was commonplace in public works yards. At the time of the offence, “there was an acute lack of clarity about the practice,” he said.
In a statement to The Tri-City News today, PoCo chief administrative officer Kristen Dixon said: “The city takes our duty to safeguard our citizens’ tax dollars very seriously. When we learned about a longstanding coordinated scheme to steal from the city — and by extension, from Port Coquitlam taxpayers — we did our due diligence and took the actions necessary to investigate and address the matter.”
She added: “The city has in place conflict of interest and use of municipal equipment policies that are communicated to staff. We have learned from this and continue to strive to grow as an organization.
“Since this incident, the city has reviewed the structure, processes and procedures in place for monitoring the inventory, usage and disposal of city property, and implementing measures to help prevent such thefts in the future.”
The Lewis conviction comes less than two years after another former PoCo employee was sentenced for stealing about $175,000 from the city.
Dean McIntosh pleaded guilty to one charge of false pretences over $5,000 after — over a three-year period — he bought tools using a city credit card and through the city’s purchasing system to resell for profit. McIntosh confessed, apologized and reimbursed the city in full.
