A company that paid ministerial aide Dave Basi $50,000 to assure a good “future relationship” with him, and for help they thought he provided in getting property released from the Agricultural Land Reserve, has been found guilty of offering a bribe.
Shambrook Hills Development Corp. entered a guilty plea in the Supreme Court of British Columbia on Friday, and was fined $200,000.
At the same hearing, three counts of fraud and breach of trust were stayed against Anthony Young and James Duncan, two principals
Prosecutor Janet Winteringham told court company officials had met Mr. Basi in 2002, when they were trying to get property removed from the Agricultural Land Reserve in Sooke, just outside Victoria.
At the time, the recently elected Liberal government was undertaking a core review of government services, and as a result, the company’s ALR application had stalled.
Mr. Basi, who was an aide to finance minister Gary Collins, told Shambrook he’d make inquiries about the status of their application.
Reading from an agreed statement of facts, Ms. Winteringham said that, on behalf of Shambrook, Mr. Basi called officials in the Agricultural Land Commission, and the property was subsequently removed from the ALR. The court never heard what Mr. Basi asked commission officials to do.
But Ms. Winteringham said Mr. Basi’s efforts did not influence the commission, which had already decided the land should come out of the ALR.
“The commission was from the outset prepared to exclude portions of the property,” she said.
On June 9, 2003, the commission issued a certificate authorizing the removal of the land from the ALR, clearing the way for Shambrook Hills to start a housing development.
A few months later, Ms. Winteringham said, Mr. Basi asked Shambrook Hills officials for $50,000, which he said he needed to help his mother buy a house.
Ms. Winteringham said Mr. Basi got an acquaintance, who wasn’t named in court, to set up an account and a business to receive the cheque, which the company provided on Aug. 26, 2003.
She said $50,000 was paid by the shell company to Mr. Basi’s wife
Ms. Winteringham said the company made the payment thinking Mr. Basi had helped get the land out of the ALR, and because he was seen as “a politically influential person,” whose future relationship the company wanted to secure.
Defence lawyer Richard Peck said company officials regretted making the payment.
“This property was coming out of the ALR at any event. This was hardscrabble land … why they turned to Basi to assist in this matter is beyond understanding … This was an act of sheer folly on the part of this company,” Mr. Peck said.
He noted that while waiting for the matter to come to trial, Shambrook Hills made a voluntary donation of about $91,000 to help save Madrona Farms, a property outside Victoria where the Land Conservancy of B.C. was trying to stop development.
Mr. Peck said the donation helped the Land Conservancy buy the farm, and he asked the court to take that donation into account when considering the size of the fine.
Judge Anne MacKenzie said a $200,000 fine for the company was appropriate.
Last Monday, Judge MacKenzie sentenced Mr. Basi to house arrest, for two years less a day, for accepting bribes in return for leaking confidential government information concerning the sale of BC Rail. She also fined him $75,000 – in effect recovering the $50,000 he was paid by Shambrook Hills and $25,000 he obtained from a lobbyist for leaking BC Rail information.
NDP House Leader Mike Farnworth called on the Liberal government on Friday to recall the legislature because of the many questions that have been raised by the court case against Mr. Basi and Bob Virk, another ministerial aide who also pleaded guilty to breach of trust in the BC Rail case.
