Calgary pawnshop owner loses licence

A Calgary pawnshop owner convicted a year ago of charging his customers a criminal interest rate has had his business licence revoked.

The City of Calgary has pulled Aly Saad Marsy's business licence for questionable business practices, it said, including the sale of allegedly pirated PlayStation video games which were being sold in the store as legitimate.

Aninvestigation that lasted 16 months resulted in 33 bylaw charges.

It's only the second time in 14 years that a pawnshop licence has been revoked by the city.

Marsy was convicted last February of criminal usury for charging his clients up to 208,000 per cent interest on loans.

The judge at the time fined Marsy $7,500 for what he called "preying on the weak and down on their luck."