An RCMP officer who was previously stationed in Innisfail was convicted of 14 criminal charges, including criminal harassment, extortion and mortgage fraud, when he appeared in the Court of Queen's Bench in Red Deer on March 23.
Const. Hoa Dong La was found guilty of two counts of criminal harassment, two counts of extortion and 10 charges of mortgage fraud. An additional count of criminal harassment was withdrawn during final arguments by the lawyers in February.
Judge David Gates put over sentencing until June 6, where the Crown and defence will make their arguments regarding a fit penalty. Until then, La will remain at large.
"This was a difficult and challenging trial," Gates said as he began to read his decision, which included a recitation of the evidence heard at trial and a discussion of the law applied to each charge.
La's charges of extortion and harassment related to his behaviour towards two separate sets of tenants. The mortgage fraud charges were for four separate properties in and around Innisfail and Bowden.
The first set of extortion and harassment charges took place over months in 2003 and 2004, the second set with different tenants between 2005 and 2006.
The mortgage frauds were alleged to have taken place in 2005 and 2006.
Gates summarized evidence he considered "key" from the trial, which started in mid-January and continued for a couple of weeks.
He started by going over the evidence from the first couple La was alleged to have harassed and extorted after they took up residency at an acreage near Bowden in 2003.
The couple were renting a Bowden-area property from La and testified about repeated incidents where La showed up, drove by with his police cruiser or regular car, pulled the woman over and kept her on the roadside for over an hour and another time to talk about the out buildings on the property along with other incidents.
Gates said it appeared that Law attempted to pressure the tenants into entering a rent-to-own agreement, which was refused and seemed to result in numerous eviction and entry notices. La said despite the lease agreement they would have to leave as he was trying to sell the property.
The woman even took the step of moving her horses after La and his wife made comments about the horses being skinny and the SPCA received a complaint.
Gates noted the testimony said it appeared to the tenants that occasionally their belongings had been searched when they'd been out of the house. He reminded the court that La apparently showed up numerous times with and without notice.
At one point, when the power was cut off due to late payment on a bill, La came out and took all of the firewood away despite the cold weather.
La brought along an auxiliary RCMP officer on some drive bys and to the house. The officer testified and corroborated some of the key events in the former tenants' testimony.
La often appeared in full RCMP uniform while on duty, Gates said.
"In my view this was a clear abuse of public office and that brings shame and dishonour to the RCMP," Gates said of La's use of the "trappings" of his office as an officer.
Gates said the court had heard the woman testify La had even followed the convoy of vehicles that was helping them move away and she was terrified he'd find out where they'd moved to.
The second set of criminal harassment and extortion charges regarded a family that began by renting a home from La. La then purchased a home for the family and they entered into a rent-to-own agreement with him.
The court heard that the couple both testified about an alleged incident that took place in April 2006. They testified the accused came to their home for a meeting after instructing them to not have the kids home and to stay back from church.
Gates reiterated evidence that La entered their home, closed the blinds and unplugged the phone. While the accused was apparently not in uniform he did have his police firearm and showed it off.
Gates went over many of the incidents that were mentioned during the trial, including an incident that occurred when the woman said she was told she'd be "very very sorry" if she contacted a lawyer about the rent-to-own agreement.
Other alleged incidents included repeated calls and working at the "flip house" that La was renovating.
La had allegedly bragged to the couple about making pervious tenants life "hell" and running them out of town, Gates said, presumably referring to the former Bowden-area tenants.
The family eventually received panic alarms from the RCMP.
The mortgage fraud charges related to three homes owned by La and one owned by his brother, who the Crown alleged was a "straw buyer" for La.
The mortgage fraud alleged for three of the properties were all similar. Gates said evidence showed La had gone to the bank and said he was buying properties with the intention that he and a family member would be using the homes in order to secure more favourable mortgage terms. Gates said it seemed clear La was intending on renting the properties from the start.
The property owned by La's brother was said to be really owned by the accused. Gates said evidence showed that La was paying his brother the amount of the mortgage.
Other evidence showed the tenants of the property never actually met La's brother until the final walkthrough when they were leaving, previous to that they'd been dealing with La and even writing the cheques to him instead of his brother until requested to switch.
There were additional charges of fraud on this property because it was alleged that the bank was persuaded to release $20,000 of "holdback" money because a fraudulent invoice was submitted to them for work that had never been done.
The invoice was changed from an estimate by one of La's other tenants, who testified that La had requested he make it an invoice.
An incident occurred during the judge's reading of his decision, which went from the morning to early evening on March 23. In the mid-afternoon La's wife, who was sitting in the gallery, approached the alleged victims in the gallery and started talking about their "lies."
Court was adjourned; the woman was escorted from the courtroom and did not return for the rest of the day. La was moved from sitting with his family to sitting in the prisoner dock while court was in session.
Gates spoke to La at the end of the day, telling him to "impress upon [his wife] it's not the kind of conduct that's appropriate."
Sentencing will be addressed on June 6. Defence lawyer Ian McKay said he would be having his client attend meetings with private professionals so a pre-sentence report-type document could be prepared to assist the judge with sentencing.
