Montreal ex-official admits to years of lavish bribes

A former senior engineerfor the City of Montreal told Quebec's corruption inquiry on Monday that he received dozens of gifts over the years in exchange for helping to rig the bidding on municipal contracts, and that one of his bribes acceptedwas a golf trip to the Dominican Republic with the reputed head ofCanada's branch of theSicilian Mafia.

Gilles Surprenant, who wasin charge ofplanning and budgeting for public works contracts, also confirmed that, as far as he knew, construction companies paid a cut of alltheir citycontracts to the Montreal Mob. And he said a furtherkickback was funnelled to the city's executive committee, thecore group of councillors from the rulingparty at city hall.

In Surprenant'sappearance at the Charbonneau commission on Mondayhespoke about the origins ofa system of bribes and collusion thattaintedcity construction contracts for nearly two decades.In the lastweeks, the public has heard explosivetestimony about bribes, bid-rigging, payoffs to Mafia bosses who stuffed the wads of cash into their socks, and illicit political financing,much of whichSurprenant is now corroborating.

The onetime civil servanttestified thathe met MontrealMob boss Vito Rizzuto twice over the period he was accepting kickbacks on construction contracts.

The first time, in 1997, he was with a fellow cityengineeron a vacation to the Dominican Republic that was organized, and paid forby the late construction bossTony Conte. Rizzuto showed up with Conte and they all played golf together.

The second encounter was around 2002, also during a golf excursion. Surprenanttold the Charbonneau commission thatthe same foursome played a round at the Mirage Golf Club in Terrebonne, Que., just north of Montreal. Rizzutomade a75-foot putt on the last hole to win, Surprenant recalled, andearned $25 from each of the city engineers because they had all placed a bet on the game.

Cost of contracts skyrocketed

Last week,the engineertold thecorruption inquiry that heaccepted about $600,000 in bribesstarting in1991in exchange for funnelling extra money to construction companiesvia thecity projects they worked on. On Monday, he delved into how he and other bureaucrats got wrapped up in that system of graft.

As early as 1995, contractors had met with Surprenant to complain that the value of contracts in Montreal was too low and that companies were losing money because there was no profit margin.

"They were taking shortcuts, they were going bankrupt, they were constantly asking for extras," Surprenant said.

Asked if he therefore started artificially inflating contracts even in the mid-1990s, Surprenant said it was possible. Earlier, he'd mentioned that anxiety medication hadcaused certain memory lapses.

In any case, between 1995 and 2000, Surprenant estimated, he received a kickback on one contract a year

But by 2000, the cost of public works contracts in Montreal exploded by as much as 25 per cent, finally coming to a plateau in the 30 to 35 per cent range by the mid-2000s.

Surprenantsaid his role was to manipulate a computer system that evaluated the cost of projects to ensure the price of contracts met what entrepreneurs wanted to pay.He would receive a call from a construction company chosen by the cartel of firms that rigged the bidding on city contracts one week before telling him the amount, and he would find a way to justify the costs.

Trips to Cuba and Mexico

Surprenant said a handful of city employeespartook in the scheme, and they got money and gifts in exchange for helping fixed contracts go through.

His treats included golfing trips to the Dominican Republic, Cuba and Mexico, some paid by construction bosses, as well as more golf at home, fancy dinners, bottles of wine, hockey and concert tickets. Inquiry investigators have identified at least 90 contracts where Surprenant took a cash cut, the kickbacks becoming rampant around 2000.

Surprenant's testimonycorroborates accusations by the inquiry's previous witness, former construction boss Lino Zambito. Surprenant said Monday that he was made aware that construction companies paid a 2.5 per centshare of the value of their city contracts to the Montreal Mafia which Zambito alleged and that another three per cent went to the city's executive committee.

Zambito testified that the three per centwent to Union Montreal, the political party of Mayor Grald Tremblay, an allegation the mayor vehemently denies.

Surprenant alsosaid he'd heard of the so-called TPS the French initials for the GST,which in this case stood for "taxe pour Surprenant," or"tax for Surprenant."But he denied it was true, calling it the invention of colluding construction moguls.

"I don't know where it came from. It's something the construction bosses came up with and they decided among themselves that one per cent went to me," Surprenant said.

Surprenant said he collected several thousand dollars on rigged contracts, but never came close to collecting one per cent of the amount.

Mafioso forced to appear

A Montreal mafioso considered to have once been Vito Rizzuto's right-hand man will have to appear before the Charbonneau commission, Quebec's Superior Court ruled Monday.

Raynald Desjardinshas received a subpoena to appear at the Charbonneau commission but went to court to block it.

Desjardins is in jail awaiting trial on afirst-degree murder chargestemming from the death last December of Salvatore Montagna, a former New York Mafia boss who went to Montreal and is thought to have tried to take over the city's Mob.