Gold heist ringleader pleads guilty to theft of $22M in gold and cash from Toronto's Pearson airport
A ringleader of Toronto’s Pearson Airport gold heist has pleaded guilty for his part in the alarming plot that saw bandits brazenly steal more than $22 million in gold and cash from an Air Canada cargo warehouse in 2023, most of which remains missing.
Arsalan Chaudhary, a 43-year-old man formerly of Mississauga, pleaded guilty Monday, officials confirmed. He has not yet been sentenced.
Chaudhary fled Canada and was named as a fugitive from justice after the heist became extraordinarily high-profile, making headlines around the world and drawing intense public and police interest. It was deemed the sixth largest gold theft in modern history and the largest in Canada.
Chaudhary r eturned to Canada in January from Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, in a mediated surrender to police at the same airport from where the gold had been taken.
Peel Regional Police had identified 10 people participating in the heist. Chaudhary’s arrest, and now guilty plea, leaves only two fugitives unaccounted for.
Chaudhary’s lawyer, Harval Bassi, said his client pleaded guilty to one charge of theft over $5,000. He said he is seeking a four-year sentence while the Crown prosecutor is asking for a seven-year sentence.
He declined to comment on behalf of his client until after Chaudhary is sentenced next month. Other charges he is facing — two counts of possession of property obtained by crime, and conspiracy to commit an indictable offence — will be dealt with, and likely dismissed, at his sentencing.
Bassi agreed to a statement of facts that was read in court in Brampton on Monday, including Chaudhary having worked through a “debt list” — which was found by police — that was an accounting of the distribution of proceeds from selling the gold, according to a report published in the Toronto Star .
The gold was eventually melted down in the basement of a local jewelry store . Because it was black market gold, it appears to have been sold at half its market value.
The jeweller alleged to have taken the gold was excited at the prospect, according to text messages sent to Chaudhary: “They got horny when they see it hahahah,” a text said, according to the Star’s report.
Chaudhary’s ledger accounted for $10.3 million, with $5 million of it going to an unidentified group, another million to a “boss,” $200,000 for “Tommy,” $150,000 to a “driver,” and for other expenses, according to the Star.
Prosecutor Jelena Vlacic, assistant Crown attorney in Peel, described him in court as a “key organizer” of the heist, the Star reported.
The heist was shockingly simple and non-violent.
A shipping container filled with the equivalent of 6,600 bars of almost pure gold, weighing 400.19 kilograms, was stolen from an Air Canada cargo facility shortly after arriving on an Air Canada flight to Toronto from Zurich, Switzerland, on April 17, 2023.
The valuable shipping container was fraudulently picked up at the warehouse by a truck driver using an old Air Canada waybill within hours of it arriving from Switzerland. The container was put into the back of a truck by a warehouse employee, and the driver just drove away with it.
The gold was valued at the time at more than $20 million. The shipping container also contained foreign currency worth about $2.5 million. The contents were being delivered by Brink’s on behalf of two clients.
On the day of the heist, and afterwards, there was a flurry of text messages and phone calls, including a warning to an alleged colleague that melting the gold would take time because there was “too much heat” after the theft was discovered, the Star reported.
Chaudhary has not yet been sentenced.
Two people remain outstanding in the probe, which involved Peel police’s collaboration with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Simran Preet Panesar, 33, from Brampton, is believed to be in India. He quit his job as a manager at the cargo warehouse where the gold was taken a few months after the heist and disappeared. He is wanted for theft over $5,000 and conspiracy to commit an indictable offence. An extradition request has been submitted.
Prasath Paramalingam, 36, from Brampton, was arrested in the original sweep but later disappeared after his release. He is the subject of a judge’s bench warrant for arrest after failing to appear in court on Aug. 19, 2024. Paramalingam is also wanted in the United States in a related gunrunning case.
Police say some of the proceeds from the stolen gold were used to buy black-market guns in the United States to smuggle into Canada. The alleged driver in the gold heist, Durante King-Mclean, 27, also from Brampton, was arrested after the heist in Pennsylvania driving a car stuffed with handguns en route to Canada, U.S. authorities said.
King-Mclean recently pleaded guilty to firearms trafficking-related charges in the United States and a new warrant for his arrest in Canada has been issued for charges of theft over $5,000 and possession of property obtained by crime over the gold.
Police have recovered only about $90,000 worth of that gold, that had been melted and fashioned into crude bracelets, police said. Investigators also found $430,000 in Canadian currency, believed to be some of the profit from the sale of the gold.
• Email: ahumphreys@postmedia.com | Twitter: AD_Humphreys
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