Canadian True Crime - 127 The Maple Syrup Heist of 2011

Episode Date: December 15, 2022

Quebec This is the story of Canada’s most valuable theft—perhaps the most Canadian crime ever committed.It was July of 2011, and Avik Caron had a kind of nervous excitement. An opportunity had fallen into his lap to stick it to the “Maple Syrup Mafia” – and, of course, line his pockets with cash as he did so. The problem was, he didn't quite know how to do it. But with Maple Syrup worth over ten times more per barrel than crude oil, what did he have to lose?More information: Winnipeg serial killer targeting Indigenous women 3 First Nations women, 1 unidentified woman were victims of alleged serial killer: Winnipeg police (includes pictures of "Buffalo Girl's" jacket)Community mourns loss of young woman who 'always had a heart for everything' (Rebecca Contois) No hope' of successful recovery of alleged serial killer's victims in landfill: Winnipeg police includes video of press conference with family members Winnipeg serial killings’ cruel details evoke horror — and familiarity. ‘I’m tired of being in danger’ Accused killer's allegedly hate-filled online presence should be factored into investigation, trial: expertsAlleged Winnipeg serial killer threatened to kill 2 previous partners, court records revealListen ad-free and early:CTC premium feeds are available on Amazon Music - included with Prime, Apple Podcasts, Patreon and Supercast. FULL LIST of resources, information sources, and credits used to make this series:The full list can be found at the page for this episode at canadiantruecrime.ca/episodes.Credits:Research, writing, sound design: Kristi LeeAudio editing and production: We Talk of DreamsProduction assistance: Jesse Hawke Theme songs by We Talk of DreamsDisclaimer voiced by the host of True Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Canadian True Crime is a completely independent production, funded mainly through advertising. You can listen to Canadian True Crime ad-free and early on Amazon music included with Prime, Apple Podcasts, Patreon, and Supercast. The podcast often has disturbing content and course language. It's not for everyone. Please take care when listening. Hi everyone, just a few things before we start. This episode is the last Canadian True Crime episode for this year. It's something a little lighter, filled with interesting bits of Canadian history, and best of all, no one gets physically hurt or murdered. By the time the episode is released publicly, my little family will be in Brisbane, Australia, seeing our families for the

first time since 2017. So to say we're excited is an understatement. There won't be an episode on January 1st, but I hope that you and your loved ones have a wonderful and safe holiday season, and I'll see you again on January 15th. Now, the other and more important thing that I want to acknowledge is devastating. On December 1st, the Winnipeg Police Service announced that they have an alleged serial killer in custody, charged with murdering four Indigenous women in Manitoba. The remains of 24-year-old Rebecca Contois from Crane River First Nation were found dumped in a garbage bin near an apartment building in May. DNA led police to make an arrest fairly quickly, more on that in a second, but after a few months of investigating,

they've announced three more victims, 39-year-old Morgan Beatrice Harris and 26-year-old Mercedes Myron, both of Long Plain First Nation, as well as a third unidentified woman believed to also be Indigenous, named Buffalo Girl by Elders. The police released an image of a jacket believed to belong to her in the hope that someone will recognise it. Not surprisingly, this story is not getting the widespread coverage that I've seen in other similar cases. Now, the remains haven't been found yet, but police say that all three women were linked to the accused through DNA. The Winnipeg Police believe that their remains are in the prairie green landfill north of Winnipeg, but they announced they have decided not to search it because they say there

are challenges and there's quote, no hope of a successful recovery. At a press conference at Ottawa on Tuesday, the daughters of Morgan Harris bravely spoke out about their heartbreak when they learned about this. I'll let them speak for themselves. Here's Kira Harris. You are the police. You are here to help our community and give right to the citizens. How is this doing your job? If you can't find them, then why haven't you asked for help? Why can't you ask for help nationwide rather than just having a small amount of people conduct the searches? These are four women. One you have found, but now you refuse to find the last three. What is the reasoning for that? We have the people who are willing to help and do the work

for you, but you are not accepting it. And this is her sister, Cambria. They believe that they're in the prairie green landfill and the police won't do anything. And they say that they can't search because it's not feasible. Is human life not feasible? Time and time again, our Indigenous women and brothers and sisters have to come here and we have to shout and we have to raise our voices begging for change and begging for justice for our people. The police are trying to cover themselves because they know that they fail our woman time and time again and it needs to stop. Your government started this genocide and now it is your turn to help us end it. Miigwech. Incredibly powerful words from the daughters of Morgan Beatrice Harris,

our sincere condolences to them and all the loved ones of these women. The government they're referring to is of course the colonial Canadian government who was responsible for the Indian Act and also the subsequent governments who continue to uphold it regardless of political party. We often receive complaints about episodes being too political, which is something that can't be avoided since crime is inherently political and the criminal justice system could not exist without politics. But this crime is literally political. The man charged with four counts of first degree murder is 35 year old Jeremy Skibiki, a white supremacist activist with a criminal record that includes domestic violence and stalking against his ex-wife. Screenshots of his Facebook

account before it was taken down reveal violent sentiments and fascist, misogynistic, racist and anti-semitic material. His lawyer states that he's pleading not guilty. I wish I had more time to report on this but for now please see the show notes for more information. And with that it's on with the show. I'll see you again on January 15th. This story takes place in small town Quebec starting in July of 2011. Evique Caron had a kind of nervous excitement because an opportunity had fallen into his lap but he didn't quite know what to do about it. The 39 year old was not someone who played by the rules. He was a former financial planner turned fraudster and just months earlier he

had pleaded guilty to charges related to fraud over $5,000. That time it was an insurance agent scam but it hadn't been the only one. Fortunately the courts were lenient on him and he was able to avoid jail time. Evique Caron and his wife lived in the south of Quebec near a tiny town of about a thousand residents called Saint-Louis Blanford. The town is located just off the highway about two hours drive northeast from Montreal towards Quebec City. Evique's wife was part owner of a massive multi-purpose warehouse located in an industrial area and in July of 2011 a new client had approached the warehouse looking to store about 16,000 barrels. A deal was made and the client started moving in. As it turned out those barrels contained 3.4 million litres

of maple syrup stacked six barrels high and hundreds of barrels deep and no one seemed to think much of it but Evique Caron was watching with interest. Maple syrup is a large industry in the province of Quebec and he knew that the sweet sticky liquid held some serious value. At the time a barrel of maple syrup was worth 13 times more than a barrel of crude oil but the client didn't seem to be very concerned about security. There were no security cameras, alarm systems, nothing. The only thing protecting the maple syrup was the padlocked gates and locked doors of the warehouse as well as a security guard who was supposed to stop by each day for a casual visual check. The general attitude seemed to be it's just maple syrup.

But Evique Caron knew better than that when he realised that the warehouse his wife partly owned was potentially storing millions of dollars worth of liquid gold the hamster wheel in his brain started spinning. Could he steal some of it and even if he could what would he do with it? How would he convert that liquid gold into cash? Evique wasn't involved in the maple syrup business at all but he knew enough to know that selling maple syrup stolen from Quebec wasn't going to be an easy prospect. He was going to have to get past a group known as the Maple Syrup Mafia. We can't tell the story of the great Canadian maple syrup heist without explaining why criminals

would consider it heist worthy in the first place. It's a strange and surprising story but first we have to start with a quick history lesson. We all know maple syrup is high on the list of things considered to be super Canadian and it's often considered Canada's gift to the world. The main feature of the Canadian flag is a giant maple leaf and many Canadian brands have incorporated maple leaves into their logos like you know the Maple Leafs, Air Canada, Molson, Canadian Tire, Petro Canada, this podcast. Even the McDonald's logo is not immune the Canadian version has a tiny little red maple leaf right in the middle of the golden arches. The main habitat where sugar maple trees can be found is called the Maple Belt which stretches through the southern parts of

Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick as well as the northern US states just below including New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine and New York. It was the indigenous peoples of North America who first discovered maple syrup or should I say they were the first to discover that there was sap flowing from the maple tree that could be processed into something useful and nutritious. Each spring pressure from warming temperatures cause the maple sap to flow up the roots of the tree so the indigenous would pierce the tree trunk with an axe and insert curved pieces of bark to facilitate the flow. After the sap is collected and a receptacle it needs to be processed, boiled down and condensed into the sweet maple syrup we enjoy on our pancakes. But the pleasant taste was just the tip of the

iceberg to the indigenous peoples who also used it to cure their meats so that they lasted longer and utilised it as a serious source of energy and nutrition. In the 1600s the indigenous taught the first European colonists how to tap into the maple trees and process that sap into syrup and over time the French settlers to Quebec began to produce the syrup for profit setting up what's known as sugar shacks near the hardwood forests and introducing their own innovations to the process. Today more than 70 percent of the world's maple syrup is produced in Canada and of that more than 90 percent is produced in the province of Quebec. It's a common pantry item for us here and we love to turn our noses at that generic and tasteless pancake syrup because we have

access to the pure genuine maple syrup the good stuff. In Quebec maple syrup season could be considered as much of a cultural phenomenon in spring as pumpkin picking is in the fall and visitors flock to maple tree forests to see the sap being collected. They can also visit the sugar shacks on farms to watch the sap being boiled down into maple syrup which they can purchase in small amounts directly from the producer along with other maple syrup products like candies and taffy similar to when you visit a small farm. The Canadian maple syrup industry has a very good global reputation and this is by design. Quebec takes maple syrup very seriously so seriously in fact that the entire industry there is strictly regulated and controlled by a

government sanctioned organisation a legal cartel. It wasn't always like that though like most things it began with a problem that needed a solution and that problem was profitability. Maple syrup production is seasonal taking place between each February and April as the warming spring temperatures prompt the flow of the sap. For it to flow the night temperature must fall below freezing and rise above freezing during the day and the season usually lasts for about four to six weeks until there are no more freezing temperatures and even in that tiny harvest window the flow of sap can be fickle so the harvest yield or the amount of sap collected from the trees can vary widely from year to year. Because it's dependent on the weather some years there's a

feast but the industry struggles to deal with the surplus and the prices dive. Other years are a famine where there isn't enough syrup produced to meet the demand for it and the prices surge. Maple syrup was a lucrative product but the short season and harvest instability meant that it was difficult to make a living from. In the late 1950s Quebec producers and farmers gathered to discuss just how they might fix the problem. They decided that if they all worked together to collectively market Quebec's liquid gold they could strengthen and stabilise maple syrup production increase its demand and improve its value. The ultimate goal was to turn maple syrup from a secondary farming activity that

essentially gave producers some extra pocket money into a proper industry that they could rely on to feed their families. That group of producers established the organisation then called the Federation of Quebec Maple Syrup Producers and by 1989 all producers who sold in bulk or wholesale in Quebec were required to abide by a collective agreement. This meant that the marketing and promotion of the syrup was put under the control of the Federation to be handed centrally with a consistent branding message. The Federation would also handle pricing and selling strategies as well as quality control measures with the goal of balancing business relationships, stabilising prices and standardising working conditions. Growing the demand for maple syrup

was a big priority for the Federation who took an active role in promoting Quebec maple syrup on a global stage with culinary competitions, maple syrup tastings and various large-scale brand partnerships. Over the decades maple syrup gradually became more and more reliable as an industry. There were less bankruptcies, less farmers and producers complaining about bad harvest years or no buyers for what they did have. Finally they were starting to see a steadier and more reliable flow of money but the Federation of Quebec Maple Syrup Producers had even grander plans. Perhaps the most impactful and controversial changes started in the year 2000 when the global strategic reserve of maple syrup was established. It's basically a warehouse where excess maple

syrup is stored to offset the unpredictability of the harvest season. So in good harvest years when there's more syrup produced than there were buyers instead of that syrup being discounted for sale it would be set aside in the strategic reserve and during bad harvest years when there isn't enough syrup produced to meet the demand the surplus can be released. The Federation's website states quote in this way we are virtually never out of stock and the markets remain supplied. Less than two years after the reserve was established there was an annual general meeting where Federation members voted to establish a central sales agency. An exclusive one-stop shop that would connect bulk maple syrup producers to buyers and also ensures that producers and

buyers comply with all the Federation's policies including prices and conditions of sales. It was called the Quebec Maple Syrup Producers Sales Agency and from that point on maple syrup producers were bound by a series of rules. They could still sell in small amounts direct to consumers from their sugar shacks but they were prohibited from selling in bulk to anyone except the Federation's sales agency. They had to accept the prices set by the Federation. Who would then store the syrup in bulk containers in a warehouse and act as a sales agent and there was more. Two years after that in 2004 the Federation introduced production quotas rules that further control supply by dictating which producers can tap their maple trees each year

and how many taps they can use. These changes were a hit with many producers who were happy to focus on production of maple syrup and let the Federation take care of everything else, the collective marketing, the promotion and the sales. But others did not appreciate these rules and found them stifling and as history has shown time and time again when something of high value to consumers is restricted or criminalized a black market always pops up. Avik Karan had no idea how to sell stolen maple syrup on the black market. He had criminal contacts sure but trafficking maple syrup was a little bit outside of his scope. He wasn't about to give up though. He just needed to find someone who operated in that space. A person who facilitates maple

syrup deals between independent producers and unauthorized distributors outside of the Federation's rules. A person also known as a barrel roller. Do you have a passion project that you're ready to take to the next level? Square Space makes it easy for anyone to create an engaging web presence, grow a brand and sell anything from your products to the content you create and even your time. When I launched this passion project six years ago I needed some kind of online hub to manage all the non-podcasting tasks that come with podcasting. I chose Square Space because it's an all-in-one platform that seamlessly helps me achieve multiple goals. It's important to have a website that looks good and

I was inspired by Square Space's wide selection of clean and modern templates. They can be easily customized with pre-built layouts and flexible design tools to fit your needs and you can even browse the category of your business to see examples of what others have done. I used the built-in blogging tools to create a new page for each episode and there are so many intuitive options from embedding an audio player so listeners can stream episodes to scheduling posts to be published on a certain date, an easily moderated comment section and automatically displaying recent episodes on the homepage. Every Square Space website and online store includes SEO tools to help you maximize your visibility in search engines and I love the powerful insights I can

get from the analytics tools helping me better understand who's visiting the site, where they came from and how they're interacting with it. Do you have a passion project or business idea or something to sell? Go to squarespace.com slash ctc for a free trial and when you're ready to launch use offer code CTC to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain that's squarespace.com slash ctc with offer code CTC and get your passion project off the ground today. Avik Karan started asking around and it wasn't long before one of his contacts, a truck driver called Sebastian Dutra, told him he knew just the person. A meeting was arranged at a truck stop where Sebastian introduced Avik Karan to 34-year-old Richard Valier, a well-known

barrel roller considered to be one of the best in the black market maple syrup business. The industry was in Richard's genes. His father Raymond owned a sugar shack where he produced maple syrup but the family were also among a growing number of smaller and independent producers who were not happy with being forced into the Federation system. They could only produce the exact quota as set by the Federation no more and had to accept the prices and policies also set by the Federation. Many producers had built up their own local customer bases which they were forced to abandon after the Federation's exclusive sales agency was established. Maple syrup in Quebec had turned into a monopoly that was crushing their businesses with the full support

of the Quebec government who had enacted the maple syrup sap and maple syrup order to enforce the rules and through all of this they had no choice but to continue to pay mandatory marketing fees to the Federation despite having no option or say in the collective marketing strategy. The combination of all these rules not only affected the profitability of smaller and independent producers but it removed any semblance of control they had over their own businesses which made them feel helpless. To many smaller producers it became like big syrup where a small group of the largest producers made the rules and all the small indies had no legal choice but to abide by them. There were thousands of producers of maple syrup in Quebec and a small

portion of them started to become fed up with the Federation's overstepping. Many of them had been producing syrup independently before the Federation created the monopoly and all the rules and they wanted to return to that. In the mid to late 2000s many of these small producers saw the value in the Global Strategic Reserve which carried the industry through several very bad production years keeping the demand and supply stable but by the end of the 2008 season the reserve was tapped out it had run dry. This meant the Federation lost their control of the supply and demand of maple syrup which wreaked havoc on prices and destabilized the market the very thing they were trying to avoid. Urgent focus was put on building the reserve back up again

as soon as possible. To do this the Federation increased the quotas allowing more producers to harvest more sap from more of their trees. Richard Valliere didn't care much about the quotas or the rules he'd been dealing in the maple syrup black market for the better part of a decade in the year or two after the Global Strategic Reserve was established. According to court documents he regularly bypassed the Federation to buy maple syrup in bulk directly from producers in Quebec including his father Raymond and to avoid paying duties he trafficked the syrup outside Quebec where the market was free with less rules and regulations. There the syrup was considered legal although the Federation vehemently disagreed. Because Richard Valliere bought high volumes of

syrup to sell outside Quebec he had experienced several run-ins with the Federation and knew firsthand the aggressive tactics they used on dissenting producers. The Federation didn't take kindly to anyone questioning their rules or their methods of enforcing them and this made the situation worse. If there was suspicion that anyone wasn't playing by the rules the Federation would send in undercover agents to local farmers and producers to count their trees count their taps search their sugar shacks and make sure they weren't producing more than their quota or weren't selling in bulk to anyone but the exclusive sales agency. Anyone deemed to be highly suspicious would have security guards watching them like a hawk and if they were found to be guilty they could have their

syrup impounded their farm seized and face very high fines. An article by Julia Matro for Day Magazine details the story of one group of maple syrup rebels who would wait until the darkness of night to transport their maple syrup barrels from Quebec over to New Brunswick to be sold there. This is of course against the rules and the Federation caught them and fined them hundreds of thousands of dollars effectively bankrupting them in the process. The fines were set by the Federation and also collected by them with the help of their specialist lawyers. In fact in 2006 Richard Valliere himself had been fined 1.8 million dollars for the purchase of 1.5 million pounds of maple syrup outside the Federation as yet he hadn't paid the fine.

Thanks to the increased production quotas it only took a year or two for the Federation to build back the global strategic reserve of maple syrup to a point where it could be relied upon to control the market. This was good news for the industry as a whole but many smaller and independent producers were not so pleased for several reasons. The rules of payment specify they're only paid for the amount that's sold on the market that year so when there's a surplus of maple syrup that doesn't sell it's added to the global strategic reserve which is in a sale it's storage and there would be no payment until it was released by the Federation and sold on the market. And when it came to getting paid it wasn't as easy as rocking up to the Federation with

barrels of maple syrup and exchanging them for cash money. What actually happens is that the producer hands over their permitted quota of syrup and waits until the full amount of Federation sales for the year are tallied. Then each producer is paid a portion of those profits depending on how much of the total harvest was sold and the surplus goes into the reserve. Because the reserve was operating as a legal government sanctioned cartel there was nothing producers could do about any of this except wait until the next year and hope they'll get the full amount then. But according to a later report by the Montreal Economic Institute 2009 was the last year that all the annual maple syrup harvest in Quebec was sold and they had to dip into the reserve.

The next two years there was a surplus and producers saw more and more syrup going into the reserve while they only received a partial payment around 65 to 70% of the value of the maple syrup they produced. And in 2011 the stars aligned and there was a bumper harvest year for maple tree sap so much so that the Federation had to expand the reserve to a bigger facility. They found a place that according to their website covers an area the equivalent of five football fields and can store 55 million pounds of maple syrup or 94,000 barrels. As a comparison a barrel of crude oil is currently worth about 80 US but the same barrel filled with maple syrup is worth or 1300 Canadian so when full that warehouse could be holding about 84 million US dollars of maple

syrup. But that facility wouldn't be ready for a few months at least so the Federation scouted out several large warehouses to rent in rural Quebec towns to tide them over. One of them was in the tiny town of San Louis de Blanford partly owned by the wife of Avique Caron. That warehouse would hold only a portion of the reserve about 16,000 barrels of maple syrup potentially worth 20 or 30 million dollars. It was a theft risk but a Federation representative would tell a reporter for Global News' 16 by 9 show that they didn't think anyone would want to steal maple syrup in the first place and also it was insured. The warehouse had a padlocked fence, a foreman keeping a casual eye on security and the section they rented was locked.

The Federation didn't invest in any additional security systems, alarms or cameras. Through Avique Caron's criminal contacts he had been introduced to Richard Valier and at the truck stop meeting he offered the barrel roller a large quantity of pure maple syrup to sell at a good price. The offer was accepted. As the instigator of the scheme, Avique Caron would be in charge of stealing the maple syrup from the warehouse which shouldn't pose too many problems since his wife was part owner of the building and there wasn't much to speak of when it came to security. After he figured out how to get the syrup out of the warehouse he put a crew together to manage it putting truck driver Sebastian Dutra in charge of transportation.

The syrup would then be handed over to Richard Valier who would arrange for it to be trafficked out of Quebec and out of the Federation's jurisdiction where it could be sold. Richard already sold maple syrup to an exporter in New Brunswick called SK Export, Inc. who resold the syrup to companies who processed it into maple products and exported it outside Quebec and outside Canada. The company's owner, 69 year old Etienne Saint-Pierre, originally owned a maple tree farm and sold his product to Quebec but as the Federation introduced more rules and became more of a monopoly he grew annoyed with the impact it was having on his own business which was in New Brunswick and so not under the Federation's jurisdiction. He started to export maple syrup

directly from New Brunswick to buyers in the United States and in the mid-2000s he started reaching out to producers in Quebec offering them better terms and discretion if they sold directly to him. Like Richard Valier Etienne Saint-Pierre had several run-ins with the Federation who did not like what he was doing. He too had been fined several hundred thousand dollars. When Richard approached him about a new sudden influx of syrup coming to New Brunswick he agreed to purchase it to export via his established channels. The maple syrup heist operation began in August of 2011 only a month or so after the Federation rented that warehouse space to store the excess syrup. To avoid suspicion Avique Caron rented his own separate space in the warehouse

for his crew to use as a decoy. They were then furnished with the appropriate keys and passes to legitimately get in and out whenever they wanted. Four months between midnight and sunrise the crew would show up at the warehouse with a tractor trailer which they then loaded with barrels of maple syrup. The person in charge of this leg of transportation was Sebastian Dutra the same truck driver who played matchmaker between Avique Caron and Richard Valier. One thing he and the crew had to keep in mind was that the global strategic reserve inventory was inspected and audited once a year so it was possible that someone from the Federation could show up at any moment but they knew that they wouldn't actually be opening the barrels because the maple syrup had

already been inspected quality checked and graded by the time it gets to the reserve. The annual inventory inspections only focused on counting the number of barrels and a visual check that everything looks right. Since the inspectors can't tell what's in the barrels the daring maple syrup thieves decided to replace the heavy barrels of maple syrup with heavy barrels of water. A straight swap of barrels was out of the question because the Federation used distinctive blue white coloured barrels so here's what they decided to do. They would load the Federation barrels of maple syrup onto the tractor trailer and transport them to a secondary location. The sugar shack owned by Richard Valier's father Raymond. There they

opened up the Federation barrels and siphoned the maple syrup out and into the new barrels. After topping up the Federation barrels with water from a nearby lake they put them back on the tractor trailer and returned them to the warehouse before sunrise. That was Avi Caron's part and the next leg of the journey for the stolen maple syrup was in the hands of Richard Valier and his crew. He had arranged a small network of trusted contacts, truckers, transporters and exporters to help him transport the syrup out of Quebec where it was no longer criminalised and could essentially be sold as legal syrup although the Federation were obviously not cool with that. They paid producers about $1300 Canadian per barrel of maple syrup

before selling it to distributors through its exclusive sales agency but the stolen maple syrup was discounted for a quick sale at only $1000 a barrel. In New Brunswick Etienne Saint-Pierre was a long time exporter of maple syrup and a customer of Richard Valier and when he received his share of the syrup he would put labels on the barrels that made them look like they contained new Brunswick maple syrup. It would then be exported on to other provinces as well as the US and Europe. There were other buyers including a company in Sherbrooke Quebec who exported it out of Canada and to companies who used it to process into maple products. The operation went remarkably smoothly and over the next few months Avique Caron's crew returned to the warehouse time and time again

making sure they'd returned the Federation's barrels and left before any eagle-eyed warehouse staff arrived for the day. The crew counted on the fact that as long as the Federation's barrels looked the same and felt appropriately heavy if and when an inspector showed up it would likely be a while before anyone noticed that what was in the barrels wasn't pure syrup. They knew the scheme had an expiry date though. Eventually someone somewhere was going to realize what had happened whether it be an inspector showing up at the wrong time or someone realizing that the maple syrup they had purchased was tasting more like funky lake water but until then the crew were careful about which barrels were refilled with water swapping the ones in the middle of the

stack or deep at the end of the warehouse so they could buy themselves some more time. They figured that the Federation would eventually have to release more maple syrup from the reserve and would probably take the easily accessible barrels first before they got to the inner barrels and hopefully by the time they got to the barrels that had been tampered with the crew would have closed up the operation. The maple syrup would have been trafficked out of Quebec, out of Federation territory and perhaps out of Canada. They expected it would be impossible to trace where it was from. Slow and steady wins the race and little by little the crews managed to steal, traffic and sell an astonishing amount of maple syrup filling their own pockets in the process.

There were a few hiccups along the way though. In early 2012 about five months into the operation the freezing winter temperatures had caused the small lake near Raymond Vellier's sugar shack to freeze over making it very difficult to get water to refill the Federation barrels. The crew decided to change plans and rented a Montreal warehouse to do their business bringing on more people to manage it and help with syrup transportation. Eventually the crew refined their plans even more deciding they would save a trip by showing up at the global strategic reserve warehouse with empty barrels and they would do the siphoning and refilling on site with the use of a forklift. While some of the workers knew what was really

happening and were happy to be taking part in a scheme to get revenge on the Federation, others weren't in on it. According to court documents one of the employees who worked for the Federation happened to notice water around one of the barrels that day. The warehouse manager was in on the scheme. He had been hired by Avique Caron to oversee things and so he offered the Federation employee a large amount of money to stay quiet and even more if he wanted to actually join the cause and help. He agreed deciding to stand on both sides of the fence working for the Federation while overseeing the theft of maple syrup from its reserve. Through additional hires and paying people off more and more people were brought in on the scheme as the number of

cooks in the kitchen grew the less serious and risky the operation seemed to be to some crew members. But the original crew members the instigators and the ringleaders had become a little paranoid. Not so paranoid that they wanted to stop though since everything was going well and they were enjoying the extra influx of cash. As an extra layer of protection against having their personal phone numbers traced they got a bunch of burner phones to communicate with saving each other's contacts under a false name. Some people who lived in the area near the warehouse rented by the Federation did notice some suspicious activity. According to reporting by Global News one neighbour noticed that the volume of traffic on the road leading to the warehouse was unusually busy during

that time with trucks that seemed to be on the road at all hours of the night. He also noted that the gate was also left open and the lock was cut. But the whole operation continued for the next few months of 2012 with the Federation none the wiser that over a total of 10 months hundreds of thousands of gallons of maple syrup had been siphoned out of their global strategic reserve millions of dollars worth. But the morning of July 30th 2012 something happened that caused a sudden influx of panicked text messages translated from French Avique Caron texted we have a problem it's urgent are you there the guy from the Federation saw the truck Richard Vellier replied calm down please I am calm Sebastian Jutra entered the chat

the Fed is on their way to do their annual inventory make a lot of dust we are going to play with the lights they will be low and then finally Sebastian Jutra the alarm went off in the warehouse is everything okay that July morning an auditor arrived at the San Luis Blanford warehouse for the annual inspection it was an intimidating stack of thousands of barrels six barrels high and hundreds deep but he proceeded to pick a spot to start the inventory each barrel full of maple syrup is estimated to weigh about 270 kilograms or 600 pounds heavy enough to make climbing a stack of them quite safe but that morning one of them nearly toppled over when the inspector

stepped on it something was not right here he tapped on one barrel and noticed it sounded different from the others he contacted the Federation immediately and when they arrived he told them that he suspected many of the barrels were actually empty when the Federation realized that they had been had and may have lost up to 30 million dollars worth of maple syrup they sent out an urgent request to the police the Quebec police knew the score and launched a large-scale investigation immediately starting with a thorough search of the barrels in that warehouse the empty barrels had given themselves away pretty quickly but over the next few weeks subsequent inspections of the warehouse's 16

thousand barrels revealed the full extent of the problem many barrels appeared full but when they were opened it was discovered that they didn't contain maple syrup and that's not all they noticed the white blue barrels used by the Federation were always impeccably clean and special forklifts were used to keep them that way forklifts that grabbed the barrels around the top edge lip kind of like how a can opener clamps on investigators noticed that not only were some of the barrels in the stack dirty with dents and scrapes fingerprints and footprints but there was also clear evidence of rust marks the Federation advised them that this was all highly irregular and determined that the barrels must have been moved around using a forklift

they would never use one that gripped the middle of the barrels investigators looked into the forklift situation some more San Luis Blancford was only a small town so they figured it shouldn't take too long to canvas forklift rental companies Quebec police assigned a sizable budget to the investigation so they could bring in more officers as well as the RCMP the Canada Border Services Agency and United States Immigrations and Customs Enforcement it was quickly determined to be some kind of inside job and because there were no security cameras on site the focus quickly turned to people who had access to the warehouse investigators began interviewing each person one by one when they were asked if they saw

anything strange happening or if they noticed anyone at the warehouse when they shouldn't be investigators noticed that a number of names seemed to bubble up frequently according to court documents some people reported frequently seeing a tractor trailer owned by a company called Sebastian Express at the warehouse the company was reportedly transporting fruits and vegetables meanwhile investigators had canvassed all the places that rented forklifts and obtained the details of recent clients one of the names that came up was Sebastian Dutra the owner of Sebastian Express he was brought in for questioning and confirmed he had been contracted to transport

maple syrup but insisted he didn't know where it came from and didn't know it was stolen he denied all knowledge of what happened but eventually investigators were able to convince him to give up more and more information they followed the trail of the men believed to be the ringleaders in the operation and a month into the investigation they raided the warehouse of SK exports at Kedgewick New Brunswick there they recovered about 700 barrels of maple syrup the owner 69-year-old Etienne Saint-Pierre confirmed that he frequently bought Quebec syrup from Richard Vallier and he also confirmed that he was aware of the federation and its rules but because his business was in New Brunswick he didn't consider himself under the same umbrella

during this time the general public had no idea that several law enforcement teams were effectively investigating Canada's most valuable theft in history the biggest in Quebec but no one really knew until about six weeks into the operation when the federation publicly announced that they had discovered a large quantity of maple syrup had disappeared from their warehouse and they were working with the police to investigate the whole situation seemed almost comical with the media reporting that with a serving size of one tablespoon of maple syrup per pancake the stolen maple syrup would have been able to service 103 million pancakes other media outlets reported with headlines like police hunt sticky-fingered maple syrup thieves and

sweet heist for the thieves who stole 30 million dollars of maple syrup the news started hitting international headlines and many had a laugh about how it was the most Canadian crime ever committed but to Avique Caron and Richard Vallier this situation was anything but a comedy Richard texted this message have you heard the news throw the phones out now the party's over that was the end of august 2012 by december investigators had questioned over 300 people as well as those involved with the warehouse they're spoken to key people in maple syrup production marketing and transportation they issued more than 40 search warrants in new Brunswick

Ontario and in the northern states of america with the help of those us customs officers investigators had two objectives to bring the people responsible to justice and to try and recover the syrup that had been stolen or as much of it as they could they discovered the warehouse in Montreal that had been rented after the lake froze over and when they raided it they found a post-it note with Richard Vallier's name on it and then in the week before christmas of 2012 the police started making arrests 34-year-old Richard Vallier and 39-year-old Avique Caron were charged with theft conspiracy handling stolen goods and fraud several days later Quebec police reported they had arrested a total of 18 people with seven suspects still yet to be

located investigators had determined that over a space of 10 months the thieves had managed to siphon the maple syrup out of 9500 of the 16 000 barrels stored at that warehouse almost two thirds worth the stolen syrup was only about 13 percent of the entire global strategic reserve at the other warehouses but its value was estimated to be around 18 million dollars through extensive questioning and old-fashioned investigation work the police had been able to track a large amount of syrup out of Quebec and into the legal syrup market in new Brunswick they traced syrup that was exported across the US border to a candy processing plant in the state of Vermont the owner often purchased maple syrup from Canada to process into maple flavored candies and insisted

he had no idea that the syrup he purchased was stolen from the Federation while a bunch of the stolen maple syrup had been recovered including those barrels found at Etienne Saint Pierre's warehouse much of it was condemned as a serious health risk as it turned out investigators had discovered quite a bit of evidence that suggested both crews became sloppy and careless over time Evique Caron and his crew were supposed to be refilling the Federation barrels with water before they put them back so how did the inspector not only find one empty barrel but so many others investigators knew that the operation started with Sebastian Dutra picking up the Federation barrels and transporting them to Richard Vallier's father Raymond's sugar shack where they siphoned

it into new barrels refilled the Federation barrels with lake water and returned them investigators also knew that when the lake froze over the crew had rented a warehouse in Montréal to do the siphoning and refilling instead and at some point a decision was made to save a trip and just do it all on site at the Federation warehouse using the rented warehouse to store the syrup they had stolen what appears to have happened is that after several months of the operation the crew would have seen for themselves that there was very little oversight with the global strategic reserve and perhaps questioned why it was necessary for them to siphon and refill every barrel that same night they started leaving without refilling the empty barrels

perhaps making a note to do it next time that never happened it seemed that the only risk factor they took seriously was that inventory inspection which happened only once a year they assumed they would be tipped off before it happened and even if the inspector did show up unannounced the chances of finding the empty barrels so deep into the stack of 16 000 was assessed as low that assessment was wrong but investigators also discovered something else at some point the crew stopped using their own empty barrels and switched to putting the stolen maple syrup in plastic containers designed for storing hazardous chemicals because of that hundreds of thousands of pounds of recovered maple syrup was deemed to be not fit for human consumption

and had to be destroyed according to court documents some of the people who worked for Richard Valier consumed this syrup and it made them sick in total 26 people were arrested in relation to the theft some charges were dropped others went to trial and some people pleaded guilty Sebastian Dutra owner of Sebastian Express was one of them he pleaded guilty and cooperated with the police confirming that he was the one who first introduced criminal generalist Avique Caron to his specialist counterpart Barrel Roller Richard Valier and he was the one who transported the stolen maple syrup from the Federation's warehouse Sebastian was sentenced to 42 months imprisonment for his role and was lucky to escape

a fine for the stolen maple syrup he would serve a total of eight months he also testified against the other participants at their 2017 trials at first many of the people arrested denied knowing anything about the stolen maple syrup others including the maple syrup rebels that Richard Valier had brought into the scheme claimed that their participation wasn't theft they were only fighting against a Federation that created a monopoly a legal cartel and forced their hands with all the rules and enforcement tactics Richard's father Raymond Valier who owned the sugar shack where the barrels were first siphoned and refilled would be quoted as saying stealing from thieves is not stealing he was among those who considered it a victimless crime

a Robin Hood type arrangement the 62 year old was convicted for possession of stolen maple syrup and sentenced to two years house arrest he was also fined almost $10,000 that had to be paid within one year or he would face going to jail for six months it came out that as much as $200,000 cash was exchanged for each syrup transaction investigators had found cash in shoe boxes during their raids and also discovered a large rotation of burner phones through which they were able to track the text messages to investigators the scheme operated the same as any major drug deal and as one maple syrup rebel would point out in an episode of the netflix documentary dirty money quote here in Quebec drugs are decriminalized but they have criminalized maple syrup the

Federation managed to turn buyers into criminals even though Avique Caron was the one who noticed the syrup stored in his wife's warehouse and initiated the whole thing it was barrel roller Richard Valier who was portrayed by the prosecution as being the main ringleader of the heist at trial Richard defense was that at first he didn't know that the maple syrup was stolen from the Federation he simply said yes to Avique Caron's offer to purchase maple syrup he was a barrel roller after all he testified that about a month into the operation he realized where the syrup had come from and he told Avique that he wanted out he testified that Avique pulled a handgun out and threatened to kill him and his family if he didn't buy the rest of the syrup

saying I know where you live in the witness box Richard Valier broke down and tears at this point and told the jury that he was led to believe that Avique Caron was connected to the mafia not the maple syrup mafia but the Montreal mafia he said he was terrorized by these threats and turned to alcohol and sleeping pills to help him relax the crown pointed out that this was the first time Richard had ever claimed he'd been threatened at gunpoint he never told the police that nor did he tell anyone else until testifying he responded by saying that he'd been too scared because after they were both arrested Avique Caron had threatened him in the holding cell the crown also pointed out text messages between them that suggested the relationship was friendly

and showed the jury a photo taken in March 2012 which was just over the halfway point into the operation it was also maple syrup harvest season and Richard Valier, Sebastian Dutra and three other alleged accomplices took a vacation in Cancun, Mexico where they ordered a souvenir photo that showed them partying and having fun Richard testified that he sold roughly 10 million dollars worth of maple syrup and cleared about one million of that for himself he admitted that he splurged on vacations with his family and had never paid personal income tax or company tax for any of his three companies Richard Valier was found guilty of fraud trafficking and stolen goods and theft at sentencing the judge said that the penalty needed to be proportional to the gravity of the

offence citing Canadian law that states when stolen property can't be returned to its owner the fine must be equal to the value of the stolen goods he was sentenced to almost eight years in prison and had six hundred thousand dollars confiscated and because the stolen maple syrup wasn't able to be recovered he was ordered to pay almost 10 million dollars in fines and if he didn't pay that fine within 10 years another six years would be added to his prison sentence New Brunswick exporter Etienne Sampierre testified at his trial that he didn't consider what he'd done to be fraud and he even presented a federal certification that reportedly allows him to buy syrup in Canada he told the court you can't prove what tree that syrup came from the 73 year old

the 73 year old was found guilty of fraud and theft and was sentenced to two years house arrest with a fine of 1.3 million dollars which had to be paid over the next 15 years or else he would be sent to prison for five years when it came to Avique Caron he ended up pleading guilty to theft and trafficking at his sentencing hearing the then 43 year old told the court that he wanted the operation to end in November of 2011 after just four months but he claimed that the members of the Montreal mafia who he didn't name had involved themselves in the scheme and were putting pressure on him to continue while the police's evidence showed he likely received more than three million dollars in profit he told the judge that he'd only pocketed about four hundred and thirty thousand

dollars the judge concluded that there was no evidence the theft was carried out under the direction of a criminal organization like the Montreal mafia Avique Caron was sentenced to five years in prison with a fine of 1.2 million dollars he was furious and immediately argued with the judge that his defense lawyer had misled him by telling him to plead guilty he demanded that he be granted a trial with a jury and when the judge refused Avique Caron swore at him banged on a door in the prisoner's box and tussled with a guard who tried to restrain him a total of 17 people were convicted in connection to the theft which the media coined the great Canadian maple syrup heist also one of the most outlandish and unbelievable agricultural crimes

ever committed there were of course appeals Richard Valier argued that his fine of 10 million dollars was excessive and he would never be able to pay it back in time the appeal court determined that his fine should be more in line with the amount of profit he received rather than the value of the syrup stolen and lowered his fine to 1 million dollars the crown announced it would appeal the decision to the supreme court of Canada in February of 2022 Richard Valier appeared before the parole board of Canada and admitted that he took part in the heist for profit and because he had developed a taste for luxury goods but also because he was seeking revenge on the federation he said he now realized the impact that the theft had on many innocent maple syrup

producers how flooding the market with stolen maple syrup at cheaper prices affected the demand and supply dynamic and they had no choice but to discount their own syrup he was granted day parole just two months later in april of 2022 the supreme court of Canada ruled to reinstate Richard Valier's original fine of almost 10 million dollars in the aftermath of the great canadian maple syrup heist there had been many questions the federation sheepishly admitted they didn't think anyone would steal the maple syrup even though it's not the first time maple syrup had been stolen in kebek they admitted they weren't overly concerned about security but wouldn't be making that mistake again they invested

four million dollars to upgrade their new storage facility complete with the appropriate security system but others pointed out that the heist wouldn't have happened in any other province but kebek where the federation has the monopoly in 2015 the kebek government commissioned a report on maple syrup noting that the province's grip on the global maple syrup market was being challenged by increasing maple syrup production in the northern states of the us the report warned that the monopoly system is effectively strangling the kebek maple syrup industry and called for the legal cartel to be disbanded along with the strict quotas and regulations nothing appears to have changed in each of the 10 years after the maple syrup heist in 2011 there's been a surplus in production

where barrels and barrels of maple syrup were sent to the global strategic reserve only giving producers a partial payment finally in december of 2021 the federation announced it was time to release some more syrup from the reserve apparently the maple syrup industry experienced record years in 2019 2020 and 2021 and when people started cooking more during the pandemic it drove up even more demand for maple syrup the federation released almost 23 million kilograms or 85 000 barrels from the reserve which hopefully meant that a whole bunch of producers finally got paid thanks for listening and as always thank you so much for your kind ratings reviews messages and

support it's so much appreciated for the full list of resources we relied on to write this episode and anything else you wanted to know about the podcast including how to access our ad free premium feeds visit canadiantruecrime.ca thanks also to eric crossby for voicing the disclaimer and we talk of dreams who compose a theme song i'll be back on january the 15th with another canadian true crime story see you then